On the road again with a new thermostat in place the drive to Tamworth was stressful. I was dreading every hill, thinking the car would play up. Mr C was like a cat on a tin roof – trying to see the dash on the driver’s side. “What’s the temp doing” – me “fine”, “have you got cruise control on?” Me – “no“, eventually he settled down. Thankfully there were not too many hills on the way to Tamworth because we avoided them. The countryside was beautiful – as I was driving, I thought the hills looked like a patchwork quilt of different shades of green, yellow, beige and white for the homes against a backdrop of blue skies – it was awesome.

We were going to stay a night or two in Tamworth but decided against it as we had spent two extra nights in Armidale. We stopped for lunch at the Tamworth Visitors Centre, spoke to the lovely volunteers at the centre about the best way to get to Orange. There are many routes to take, I asked for a copy of the map, sadly they don’t sell them.

I met a group of women who were animal rescue volunteers, they had a baby Joey well not really a Joey, I can’t remember the name of the marsupial, but it looks like a Joey and a baby Wombat. We spent ages talking about how they feed the babies and take care of them, it was fascinating. Mr C was busy taking photos of the giant guitar.

The town of Tamworth was just like many of the towns we had been through, I was expecting something different – because it was Tamworth, known for its country singing. I guess the best time to be here would be for the country music festival, which is in January, just a bit too far away – next time.  Mr C & I took our obligatory photos with the big golden guitar, looked at the music museum and hall of fame. We filled up with fuel, I purchased a map of NSW it has much better detail of where we needed to go and continued to Orange, Mr C was the navigator which I was really pleased about – despite us trying to avoid hills we came across them.

At one point I pulled over into a rest bay as the car was struggling and just made it up one of the hills – we waited for about an hour for the car to cool and I then continued. Only to find a few more hills and the car continued to struggle, it was really stressful – at this point we were about 2kms from a 24hr rest bay – we arrived at The Black Stump just north of Coolah. I called it a day. It was a nice rest area with toilets and a few other people around – we had a light dinner and an early night.

I thought, ‘wow’ – there is a place called the Black Stump I’d heard the saying “beyond the black stump” meaning ‘the middle of nowhere” but I didn’t think there was an actual place – well this is it – there is a black stump – a tree that was burnt. The local Aboriginal Gamilaraay people called the area ‘Weetalibah-Wallangan’, meaning ‘the place where the fire went out and left a burnt stump’ We stayed the night. I googled The Black Stump for the purpose of my blog and found an interesting post giving some history – click the link to read further.

I thought it would be better if the car broke down then we would know what the problem was – the car was all day at the Ford dealer in Armidale. Now we have to book it in again at Orange. Frustrating!!!!!!

Morning coffee break was made in a town called Wellington. I could not get used to the idea there was a Wellington in NSW – the only Wellington I know is in New Zealand – it took some getting used to. I thought this was a unique little town, it was vibrant however, some empty shops, beautiful buildings, it was lovely. Called into the Information Centre again they were very helpful. Gave us a run down on the history of the town and its name – yes, the town was named after the Duke of Wellington (England). We picked up a couple of postcards, some freebee doggie high visibility kerchiefs about driver reviver and we had brunch at the “Four Fat Cats” – which happened to be an old infant school building – it was great.

Orange

I remember going to Orange for a weekend as a nursing student, oh so many years ago. It seems very different now – I loved the tree lined streets and the beautiful old houses with the Bull-nose verandas, it’s all so very pretty and Australian.

It seems coincidental that Mr C and I both spent time in our early adult life crossing paths in and around NSW – the early 70’s (however me being younger than him, I wasn’t married).

As we were driving through Orange, Mr C was grumpy and said, “I really don’t like Orange”. I asked him, “why not” – “I just don’t like it“, I sensed there was another reason, and pressed him further, and to my surprise, the following story was told (Mr C is ok with me sharing his story).

Mr C was 22yrs old and newly married when he lived in Canberra. He was driving between Bathurst and Orange with his mate Barry.  They were just visiting Orange. He was driving into Orange almost in the township. When Barry said, “I can hear music in the bush” Mr C looked behind him and in the rear vision mirror and said, “no it’s a police car trying to get past me”.  In saying that he pulled over. Then the police car pulled in behind him. Mr C got out of his car, the police man got out of the passenger seat and came to him. “You’re under arrest” Mr C said “Yer wot”. Then the police proceeded to tell him, you were driving too fast. The policeman asked what speed where you doing? – Mr C said “70mile an hour” – he said – the policeman said, “we were doing over 107 mile an hour and we couldn’t catch you pulling away from us”. “Nah mate you got that all wrong” – said Mr C, “oh no“, said the policeman and put him in the police car – Barry drove Mr C’s car to the police station. The police were joking in the car with Mr C – saying “what mileage do you get out of that beast (he had a 351 Fairmont) Allan Moffatt only gets 4 miles to the gallon out of his out of his GT Falcon” – Mr C laughed and said, “I don’t drive at silly speeds I get 18 miles to the gallon“. When he got to the Police Station, they took his belt and put him in a little box and charged him with speeding. Then Barry had to find $200 to bail him out. 

Mr C could not drive to Orange for his Court appearance, so he hired a mate of a mate with an aeroplane (normal little Cessna) to fly him to and from Orange – he got mate rates for the flight. The Court outcome was a $300 fine and 12 months suspension of licence in NSW. Everyone thought it was an excessive outcome because magistrate had no jurisdiction in ACT. Barry previously had got a DUI not his first and he paid $150 fine and 6 months suspension. – I think Mr C still feels hard done by and suffers from PTSD about Orange.

Despite Mr C’s dislike of Orange, we still enjoyed our time in Orange. Our car went into the Ford dealership for another look at why it doesn’t like hills. We were very impressed with the service we received, they found the problem – it was an Exhaust Gass Regulator (EGR), it needed to be replaced – this regulator when not working correctly will put the car in limp mode and this happened each time, we went up a high hill – thank goodness the issue is resolved. Three Ford dealerships have looked at the car, how hard can it be.

Parkes

It had been over 40 years since I had last visited Parks, it has grown exponentially. My dear friend Karen and I were nursing students and I went home with Karen to Parkes to meet her family, I recall it was a lovely time. To go back and see how much Parkes has changed and to see Karen’s mother again was delightful.  We also visited the Parkes Radio telescope – read the history here. I first saw it back in the 1970’s and it looked like a dish in the middle of no-where – now the trees have grown, it was also upgraded in the 1980’s and there is a café, where we had lunch and watched the birds.

Anyone know what the name of this bird is please? we have tried to find it but have not had any luck.

Bathurst

Mr C wanted to go to Mt Panorama and so we did, I was not that interested until I saw it and the track. You can actually drive the track at 60 Km/per/hour, our 4-wheel drive was not exactly the car to drive – I did the first loop, it was fun, I was surprised how tight the corners were and how steep the mountain was – it was fun.

Mr C did two laps, one to practice and the second for fun, he enjoyed it but wished he was in racing car not a 4-wheel drive. There was no chance of speeding, we passed a marked and unmarked police car on the track, so 60km it was – we both had fun.

Bathurst was also a nice town; I was impressed with the Court House it was rather grand compared to other towns we had seen. As usual there were many churches around the town – you can guarantee churches and pubs in all the towns.

We had a leisurely walk around the park and the town, then I had the best ice-cream in Bathurst – it was Annies’s ice-cream shop, it was just delish, I could’ve had two but thankfully restrained myself. It was time to drive back to Orange and plan the next part of our trip now that the car was fixed. We had stayed two extra nights in Orange due to the car repairs and now it was time to move on. I’m so ready to go home, but we still have much to see.

The car trouble has put a dampener on our holiday, it has been so stressful but now hopefully it will be clear sailing the rest of the trip. I’m looking forward to Xmas with our friends – thankfully all Xmas cards have been sent to family and friends.

Lesson – We have been on the road for nearly six months – there are bound to be some hiccups along the way when you are traveling towing a caravan. So just accept that this will happen and go with the flow.

Next blog will be Young – Queanbeyan then the countdown home will begin after Christmas.