A short trip for a break and to visit family – Part 1 Brooms head to Armidale.

 

A very short trip to take a break from the rigours of retired life and house renovations.

Chris and I decided that we needed to get away for a few weeks and as we had not seen the Sydney grandchildren for some time we decided that after the disruption of some considerable house renovations we should visit them as an initial priority. So on Tuesday the 30^th July we set of in our new 4WD with camper in tow for Sydney town.

A bonus to visiting the grandkids was to also attend the celebration party for our son’s successful float of his company on the stock exchange.

After a week of being delighted by our most magnificent grand children (not biased at all) in Sydney we set of for Brooms Head (Near Mclean on the Clarence River in NSW – see map) to meet up with my brother and his wife who were camped at the Brooms Head Caravan Park.

On the way we had a night at Macksville on the Pacific Highway, arriving in Brooms Head late morning of the 7^th August (Wed). It is hard to believe that the Pacific Highway is one of our major highways connecting Sydney and Brisbane. It is an absolute disgrace. Exemplified by the need in Macksville of a B Double asking all the cars banked up behind his rig when he was on the approach to the bridge across the Nambucca River to back up so he could allow another rig from the other side to come across as only one rig could fit on to the bridge at any time. This on our National Highway No 1!!!!!!

Brooms Head is an absolutely delightful spot with the caravan park being right on the beach front. Perfect weather and very quiet with not too many fellow campers.
Plenty of walks along the kilometers of beaches that border the Yuragir National Park and with only the occasional fellow trekker.
Our week in Brooms Head consisted of beach walks, visits to MaClean (18km) for a coffee and supplies plus general socialising with my big brother and his wonderful wife including some games of Scrabble, 500 and Boggle. The junior Kays commanding a dominating position in all parlour games attempted.

Some typical Brooms Head scenes.

Some bird life in the Mclean, Lawrence and Brooms Head area. The Osprey’s are preparing for the patter of little fleet or the squawk of hungry beaks. The Pelicans (one of our favourite birds) are resting on their laurels as usual. And the Darters are forever drying their wings while the absolutely horrid Plovers are simply annoying all and sundry.

In Mclean while lunching on the banks of the Clarence River and taking some photos these two guys (below) insisted that they were the handsomest guys in town and their inclusion was mandatory to complete the photos. Of course the scene is further enhanced by the VB “longnecks”. I had to promise them to put their photo on my web site, so here it is. The down side is that they are from the bush and have no ready access to the internet so probably won’t see themselves. They had come to town for a funeral and were warming up for the burial so at my suggestion they promised they would stand well back from the grave to ensure they weren’t intimately included in the burial formalities. Chris and I happen to run into the funeral later in the day and it was the biggest funeral I think we have ever scene, there must have been at least 1500 people involved.

On the 14^th August we set off for home. We needed to be home by the 26^th August for some important commitments so we had 12 days to meander through NSW and Vic. We decided as always that while we do enjoy the seaside we would prefer to travel inland, so we set off across The Great Divide. Not a good time of year for this endeavour due to the very cold conditions and some not so nice weather.

We passed through Ulmarra and Grafton then headed towards Armidale along a secondary road passing through Nymboida and Ebor. A very scenic and enjoyable drive. There may be among you those who know the significance of Nymboida, but for those who don’t, frankly neither did we. At Nymboida, out of the blue, as you drive along the road there is a Pub with a lot of old style charm, sitting on the side of a beautiful river. There is fabulous accommodation over looking the river and along side the accommodation there is “The Museum Of Interesting Things”. It was only $3 to enter and despite thinking that this would just be another dodgy bush museum we paid the dough and entered the museum. When we entered the main hall we were quite gob smacked. It was brilliant. There were indeed, lots of interesting things. But then I began to become a little suspicious. While there were a number of displays of many and varied subject matter, there was a dominating theme of movies. Not just any movies, but movies with one particular movie star. The guy who set up the museum was obviously a fan of Russell Crowe. He certainly must have had some connections we thought, as there were original props and costumes from a plethora of his movies including Gladiator. When exiting the museum we had a chat to the guy on the door who happened, as it were, to have played a major part in setting the museum up. Surprise surprise, the museum, and all its contents are owned by the man himself, Mr Russell Crowe. His large rural property is apparently close by to the museum. Despite not being a fan of Crowe the man, he is a great actor and the museum is well worth a look.

We camped that night at Little Styx River on the edge of New England National Park. An idyllic spot but cold. On the journey into Little Styx River we passed the NSW fisheries trout fish spawning farm so we dropped in and purchased some sensation smoked Trout.

Next morning we headed into Armidale to plan our trip to the Pilliga Forest over a cup of coffee.

The map below shows Macksville, Brooms Head, Mclean, Ulmarra, Grafton, Nymboida, Little Styx River Camp and Serpentine River Trout Farm.

End Part 1