Heading home

From Rochester, we were soon passing through Echuca but not before we stopped to see about spending several nights at the Rotary park south of town.

We had read reports about how lovely it was but we just drove in and kept going. It's just a dust bowl and while its $10 per night it just wasn't to our liking. 

We had planned to spend the evening in Deniliquin but stopped just short in the small town of Mathoura. 
It's free parking behind the local bowls club so arriving just on lunchtime we decided to head over for lunch. Ros had the parmi and I had the chilli Cointreau prawns and rice with a few Tooheys Old to boot. Both were beautiful meals.

Our minimum temperatures for the past few days have been around 7 degrees inside the van and even colder outside so our diesel heater has been getting a workout. 

We soon passed through Deniliquin and then onto Jerilderie, Griffith, Rankin Springs and to the showground in Weethalle. At $10 per night for power and water, it's a great spot to camp.

We always use our own facilities not matter if we are in a caravan park or a showground. Even though we paid our $10 we chose to camp on our own and away from the taps and power points. So we just set up camp on a patch of dirt but unbeknown to us we had set up on the 8th fairway of the golf course. Of course with the current drought there is no grass on the fairways, just bare dirt.

We were asked to move so that the ladies could finish their round of golf. 

We were here to photograph the town's silos that were painted in June 2017, by Mongolian born muralist Heesco Khosnaran.

When the caretaker took our money and we explained that we were here to photograph the silo he showed us a photo of the just-completed silo in Grenfell.

We didn't have to deviate as we were passing through Grenfell the following day on our way to Cowra.

Heesco Khosnaran has also painted these silos.

And in this photo, Ros can be seen standing at the base of the silo.

We have passed through Cowra on many occasions but we have never stayed. This time we spent two days camped at the showgrounds with power and water for just $20 per night. It's close to town and the other attractions this town has to offer.

Another first for us was to visit the Japanese Garden and Cultural Centre. The gardens first opened in October 1979 with the second stage completed in November 1986. Seniors card discount was $13 entrance to both facilities.

Unfortunately, the skies were overcast but the forecast for the following day was continual rain and strong winds so we went ahead anyway. I'm sure the photos would be much nicer on a lovely sunny day.

Well, the weather bureau did get the forecast right for the following day. After a quick check of the shops in the main street followed by a lovely lunch at the Quarry Restaurant and Cellar Door, it was back to the van for the remainder of the evening accompanied by rain strong winds and pea size hail.

Another very cold morning so on went the diesel heater before we were game enough to have our showers and finally breakfast.

A rather short drive today of just 178 km. We went via Canowindra, Cudal, Molong and onto Wellington. Our campsite tonight is just north of Wellington at Ponto Falls on the Macquarie River.

Our last visit here was in 2008 when we had the place to ourselves and we camped down on the river flats. Not the case this time with the access road now bitumen instead of a badly corrugated dirt road. There is now also a drop toilet and rubbish bins.

Even though we are camped about 20 metres above the river we are still surrounded by lovely large river gums and a view down the river. 

The current temperature is 16 degrees but with the wind chill factor, it feels about half that. We are currently holed up inside the warmth of the van reading the Sunday papers we bought in Cowra this morning.

Unfortunately, I will have to brave the elements this evening while I'm outside cooking our Bangalow pork fillets.

We were now heading for home with today's drive taking us through Gulgong, Ulan, and onto the Golden Highway to spend the evening at Jerry's Plains.

I'm probably getting to sound like a broken record but when we first camped at Jerry's Plains many years ago we had the place to ourselves. Tonight there were twelve vans camped up for the evening.

A donation is requested which we were more than happy to pay but I did notice the 10 vans who arrived after us didn't bother to even drop a coin in the donation box. This of course, happens far too often on our travels.

We left next morning just on 9 am and for the first time used the Hunter Expressway which then joined up with John Renshaw Drive. Just over an hour later we were passing through Raymond Terrace. We had intended to spend the evening somewhere between here and home but seeing we were making such good time we decided to continue home. A brief stop in Kempsey and we were home by 3 pm.