Australia 2019 - Day 26 and 27

Day 26 - Mon 22nd July 2019  -   Lightning Ridge - Tamworth

A driving day today.

We backtracked back down to Walgett then across to Burren Junction.

 We stopped at the bore baths for morning tea.  I think these were my favourite baths yet and I was a bit sad we didn't have time to try them out.  They were not as hot as Lightning Ridge but warmer and much nicer than Pilliga.

Back on the road to Narrabri for lunch.  We headed out to a nice park Dad knew on Narrabri lake, only to find that the lake was totally drive.

The rest of the country has been patchy.  You go through one area where all the dams are empty and everything looks bare, then other area the dams are full and its green again (well green for Australia).

After Lunch we drove down through Bogabri and Gunnedah and across to Tamworth, on the outskirts of which we finally got to see Pluto.

The first motel we found off my list was the Almond Inn so we checked in there.

 Seemed really good at first, then we came home after dinner and found the place packed out with guys drinking in the parking lot.  Thankfully they wrapped it up pretty early.

After booking into our motel we took a trip around town and found a fantastic playground.

We all had a good play - including Mum which was really great to see.

Dinner at the golf club which was good - especially since they had gluten free desserts.

Day 27 - Tue 23rd July 2019  -    Tamworth - Port Maquarie

We left Tamworth heading for Walcha.

First stop was at Moonbie lookout just outside Tamworth.

Then headed onto Walcha.  Beautiful countryside but still very brown I was hoping that as we approached the coast it would get greener.

 Walcha was a really pretty little town.  One of the first I've really taken a liking to on this trip.

Next stop was Apslie Gorge.  This place is quite strange.  You are driving along rolling country hills and then all of a sudden vegetation changes and here's this huge gorge, but you can still see the rolling farmland in the distance.  very strange.

Unfortunately  there was no water in the gorge nor any going over the falls.

 But Josh and I walked down to see it anyway.

We found teh suspension bridge over the river - there was a small amount of water int he river but not much.

Since we had a long winding road in front of us we decided to have lunch before setting back off again.  Josh cooked us snags and toast and tomato on the BBQ - yummy.

I drove the next stretch as Dad said he'd never drive this road again,  It was quite windy, but I took it slowly - I don't think I got above about 40kmh the whole way down.  I stopped down the bottom at Ellenborough to check out another suspension bridge and for afternoon tea and Dad took over driving again.

We drove straight through Warchope and into Port Maquarie. I was a bit annoyed with the lady at Checkin for our apartment .  After ignoring us for 10 mins whilst she took a phone call she then told us that she'd already taken the money off my card - since I'd used my American card I was a bit annoyed but she didn't offer to change it...Still its a very nice apartment - Three bedrooms which is nice.  Josh saw the pool and wanted to go for a dip.  He told my it was heated but he lied - it was freezing.  We each managed a single dip and then jumped straight back out again.

We drove down to the center of town for a look around.

We were hoping to find someplace good for dinner but couldn't find anything.  We ended up at the bowling club just down the road where we found an all you can eat buffet  - even better it had a whole bunch of stuff marked gluten free.