We are back from our first trip with our Jayco. We travelled to Lightning Ridge for the Easter break meeting up with my parents at Gilgandra.
We started our journey at 4 o'clock in the morning on Thursday and travelled through to Gilgandra, where we filled up the tug, I was surprised with the consumption, only 16l/100km. We then went to search out my parents who travelled to Gil the previous day. We parked outside the Gilgandra Caravan Park and had breakfast While I went in to see if I could find my Parents. The park was very clean and quiet. Upon meeting up with my Parents and having breakfast we headed off before them.
We took off heading off towards the Ridge. The road up to Gulargambone, which is a very quiet little town between Gilgandra and Coonamble, was in a reasonable state. The township of Gulargambone has certainly taken some pride in itself and has some great sculptures of Galahs on the side of the road as you drive in. The sculptures are made out of corrugated iron and stand about 2.5m high. they are proudly displayed on posts as you drive through the town.
We continued our voyage North, coming into Coonamble, which is where the roads started to change from being normal to being crap. Potholes on the side of the roads were almost big enough to swallow my expanda. But, the drive continued, the Castlereagh River was flowing, which was a great sight to see. The town has changed little since we went through twelve years ago.
This left us only one more town to pass through until we arrived at out destination. There was a pretty strong head wind from Coonamble through to the ridge, which saw the fuel consumption rise to 20L/100km. The area around the road as we travelled was transformed into a wetland wonderland, with all of the water that the Walgett shire had received during the floods, the birds had come in thick and fast. Many of them nesting and brooding. The countryside was very green and the pastures were thick. We had a slight stop on the side of the road for a convenience break, the outback dunnies have a very unique lighting system, your car headlights which are reflected off two mirrors to light up the dunny, very clever I thought.
We arrived in Walgett, all I can say is, we are glad we left the area 12years ago, we drove around the town, reminiscing about the time we lived in the town, but it is so different to what we remember. We decided we had seen enough and decided to leave for the ridge.
We headed out and travelled along a very rough road, which tried out the suspension on the expanda. Very happy, nothing moved inside to van.
We finally arrived at the ridge. A grand total distance 470 km in 7 hours, it was slow driving, but the tug did not like going faster than 85km/hr. We rocked up at the caravan park. The Opal Caravan Park, which has only been open for a year, was a sight for sore eyes. This park was very clean and tidy, with massive drive through sites for all sites, and only 200m away from the hot artesian bore baths.
We set up the expanda and had some lunch. We had a bit of drive through the town and did some shopping at the local IGA, very reasonable prices.
During our stay we visited many attractions, one of them being the Big Opal walking in tourist mine, which gives a bit of history to the area and explains the formation of Opals, the kids then had a go at fossicking and found some black potch and low grade opals.
We decided that one of the days we would head out to Grawin and Glengarry. We drove through Cumborah and headed west towards the sheepyards. This road is not really suited to vans, the corrugations were about 15cm high and went on for about 50km, so the only way to get over these was to drive at 100km/hr, which to say the least was very interesting. We pulled in to the Glengarry Hilton to have lunch. The prices were reasonable and the food was good. We drove off towards the Grawin opal field in search of the elusive Kitty Litter Mountain. You really could not miss this place it was huge. The kids were excited to hop out and look for some opal, we found plenty of potch, but not much in the way of opal. We would have liked to stay longer, but the rains looked like they were coming in. Anyone who knows of the soil around that area would realised that it is not a good thing when it gets wet, so we called it a day and hightailed it back to the van.
We ere lucky enough to catch up with some old friends who now own their own mine, which he was more than generous in taking me down to have a look. It is certainly different to the tourist mines you see. A real working mine has a very rough feel to it. Many of the miners are just scratching a living and barely breaking even, so money to buy the correct safety gear is short. But I was assured that the mines are safe and that there have been not deaths due to cave-ins at these fields.
After a long day it was nice to relax in the bore baths. These are very warm, ranging from 40 degrees to 45 degrees, depending on what side of the bath you're in. The maximum amount of time you could stay immersed would have been 10 minutes, after this you started to feel like you were being cooked. I felt great after soaking in the baths, and would recommend it to anyone who visits the Ridge.
The car door doors were also very interesting. We drove on all four of the tours, which any vehicles could navigate with care, seeing sights such as the Observatory, Lunatics lookout, Amigos Castle, numerous fossicking areas, bottle houses, cactus gardens( would highly recommend this) and of course the Coocoran Opal Fields, the first fields in the area. This is where you will find the Beer Can House.The owner of the house, Matt, was very generous and showed us around his residence, if you could call it that. He bought it with plans to rebuild and restore it to the way it was. Some great scenery in the area as it sit higher than the surrounding country side. The kids found a rock maze that someone had made and explored the many heaps of soil having a bit of a scratch for opal.
Unfortunately it was time head home. We packed up the van and said our goodbyes to our hosts Helen and Mark, owners of the Opal Caravan Park. Upon going back to the car, I noticed a small gash on the side wall of the rear tyre of the tug, Oh Cr@p, just what I needed. My spare was not the best and I did not want to tow with the tyre that had a gash in it, but I decided to put the spare on and hoped it would last the distance, which it did. It only took about 20minutes for the tyre change and then we were on our way.
We drove back in the reverse order, but we did stop in Dubbo to go to BBQ's Galore to look for the elusive gas hose for the Weber, they had about 6 in stock, needless to say, I bought one on the spot. You should have seen everyone get out of my way when I drove the van through the car park. I think I will need to do that more often.
We arrived safely home and unhitched the van, only one slight problem, the bolt that makes sure the coupling sits firmly against the towball had sheared off. A new one should be here on Friday. You would think dealers would keep these in stock.
A very enjoyable trip, 6 days away, over 1400km travelled and well worth it.
We started our journey at 4 o'clock in the morning on Thursday and travelled through to Gilgandra, where we filled up the tug, I was surprised with the consumption, only 16l/100km. We then went to search out my parents who travelled to Gil the previous day. We parked outside the Gilgandra Caravan Park and had breakfast While I went in to see if I could find my Parents. The park was very clean and quiet. Upon meeting up with my Parents and having breakfast we headed off before them.
We took off heading off towards the Ridge. The road up to Gulargambone, which is a very quiet little town between Gilgandra and Coonamble, was in a reasonable state. The township of Gulargambone has certainly taken some pride in itself and has some great sculptures of Galahs on the side of the road as you drive in. The sculptures are made out of corrugated iron and stand about 2.5m high. they are proudly displayed on posts as you drive through the town.
We continued our voyage North, coming into Coonamble, which is where the roads started to change from being normal to being crap. Potholes on the side of the roads were almost big enough to swallow my expanda. But, the drive continued, the Castlereagh River was flowing, which was a great sight to see. The town has changed little since we went through twelve years ago.
This left us only one more town to pass through until we arrived at out destination. There was a pretty strong head wind from Coonamble through to the ridge, which saw the fuel consumption rise to 20L/100km. The area around the road as we travelled was transformed into a wetland wonderland, with all of the water that the Walgett shire had received during the floods, the birds had come in thick and fast. Many of them nesting and brooding. The countryside was very green and the pastures were thick. We had a slight stop on the side of the road for a convenience break, the outback dunnies have a very unique lighting system, your car headlights which are reflected off two mirrors to light up the dunny, very clever I thought.
We arrived in Walgett, all I can say is, we are glad we left the area 12years ago, we drove around the town, reminiscing about the time we lived in the town, but it is so different to what we remember. We decided we had seen enough and decided to leave for the ridge.
We headed out and travelled along a very rough road, which tried out the suspension on the expanda. Very happy, nothing moved inside to van.
We finally arrived at the ridge. A grand total distance 470 km in 7 hours, it was slow driving, but the tug did not like going faster than 85km/hr. We rocked up at the caravan park. The Opal Caravan Park, which has only been open for a year, was a sight for sore eyes. This park was very clean and tidy, with massive drive through sites for all sites, and only 200m away from the hot artesian bore baths.
We set up the expanda and had some lunch. We had a bit of drive through the town and did some shopping at the local IGA, very reasonable prices.
During our stay we visited many attractions, one of them being the Big Opal walking in tourist mine, which gives a bit of history to the area and explains the formation of Opals, the kids then had a go at fossicking and found some black potch and low grade opals.
We decided that one of the days we would head out to Grawin and Glengarry. We drove through Cumborah and headed west towards the sheepyards. This road is not really suited to vans, the corrugations were about 15cm high and went on for about 50km, so the only way to get over these was to drive at 100km/hr, which to say the least was very interesting. We pulled in to the Glengarry Hilton to have lunch. The prices were reasonable and the food was good. We drove off towards the Grawin opal field in search of the elusive Kitty Litter Mountain. You really could not miss this place it was huge. The kids were excited to hop out and look for some opal, we found plenty of potch, but not much in the way of opal. We would have liked to stay longer, but the rains looked like they were coming in. Anyone who knows of the soil around that area would realised that it is not a good thing when it gets wet, so we called it a day and hightailed it back to the van.
We ere lucky enough to catch up with some old friends who now own their own mine, which he was more than generous in taking me down to have a look. It is certainly different to the tourist mines you see. A real working mine has a very rough feel to it. Many of the miners are just scratching a living and barely breaking even, so money to buy the correct safety gear is short. But I was assured that the mines are safe and that there have been not deaths due to cave-ins at these fields.
After a long day it was nice to relax in the bore baths. These are very warm, ranging from 40 degrees to 45 degrees, depending on what side of the bath you're in. The maximum amount of time you could stay immersed would have been 10 minutes, after this you started to feel like you were being cooked. I felt great after soaking in the baths, and would recommend it to anyone who visits the Ridge.
The car door doors were also very interesting. We drove on all four of the tours, which any vehicles could navigate with care, seeing sights such as the Observatory, Lunatics lookout, Amigos Castle, numerous fossicking areas, bottle houses, cactus gardens( would highly recommend this) and of course the Coocoran Opal Fields, the first fields in the area. This is where you will find the Beer Can House.The owner of the house, Matt, was very generous and showed us around his residence, if you could call it that. He bought it with plans to rebuild and restore it to the way it was. Some great scenery in the area as it sit higher than the surrounding country side. The kids found a rock maze that someone had made and explored the many heaps of soil having a bit of a scratch for opal.
Unfortunately it was time head home. We packed up the van and said our goodbyes to our hosts Helen and Mark, owners of the Opal Caravan Park. Upon going back to the car, I noticed a small gash on the side wall of the rear tyre of the tug, Oh Cr@p, just what I needed. My spare was not the best and I did not want to tow with the tyre that had a gash in it, but I decided to put the spare on and hoped it would last the distance, which it did. It only took about 20minutes for the tyre change and then we were on our way.
We drove back in the reverse order, but we did stop in Dubbo to go to BBQ's Galore to look for the elusive gas hose for the Weber, they had about 6 in stock, needless to say, I bought one on the spot. You should have seen everyone get out of my way when I drove the van through the car park. I think I will need to do that more often.
We arrived safely home and unhitched the van, only one slight problem, the bolt that makes sure the coupling sits firmly against the towball had sheared off. A new one should be here on Friday. You would think dealers would keep these in stock.
A very enjoyable trip, 6 days away, over 1400km travelled and well worth it.
Awesome mate thats one place I want to get too :rockon: