We are well on the homeward run and I cannot say that I am not looking forward to being home. Two weeks is too long for me and I think The G agrees. We are one-week holiday people. We have regularly, perhaps even continuously, caravans on the highway. We suspect that grey nomads use many of these for long trips around Australia. This idea of towing a tiny home around and stopping at random places holds no attraction for me or The G. Indeed, The G continually checks that I will never suggest the purchase of caravan. I continually reassure her that my brain has not turned to mush.
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If anyone can tell me what this
little cover over the toilet roll
is for, then I will award them
a cash prize |
I packed the car up and it looks like we are moving house. We took breakfast at the Rendezvous in Mildura. I was intrigued by the appearance of chilli con carne for brekkie so I determined that one of these examples of jentacular gastronomy would be mine. When it came it proved to be one of the finest breakfasts I have eaten.
We visited the Oak Valley Estate winery before leaving Mildura. They do a range of moscatos which did not appeal to us. But then we sampled a Sangiovese Shiraz Zinfandel, and unusual combination, and were very impressed. The Shiraz, too was good, fill of promise and will lay down for, probably, 10 years. We left with some of each of these together with an excellent Tawny and an even more excellent Muscat.
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I must say that chilli con carne
for breakfast is not to be missed |
We called in at the Tourist Information Centre. Those keen readers of this journal will know that The G is drawn to Tourist Information Centres like moths are to flames. Her purpose was to find out (a) what is in Hay for the diversion of the passing tourist and (b) what there is to see on the way to Hay. She locked a lady in conversation who, in relation to point (b) suggested that The G “take her knitting with her”. There was, in the opinion of this worthy matron of Mildura, nothing to see between Mildura and Hay.
Our experience did not bear this opinion out. The Hay Plain is a vast expanse of scrub as far as the eye can see, and probably further. While I would not want to drive between Mildura and Hay daily, the drive is not uninteresting. It is, however, non-trivial in the sense that, because the space is so big and unvarying, your eyes and awareness can become absorbed in it. You can see how people would lose attention and career off the road.
A short way out of Mildura we passed Trentham Cliffs. We passed the Trentham Estate Winery. This is a large scale producer and, therefore, does not qualify for a visit by us. The G had sampled a glass of their product at White Cliffs and found it not to be to her taste. The road follows the Murray River through localities called Monak and Paringi. I found that there are houses for sale and rent in each of these places, and though the former merits a single line entry in Wikipedia the latter does not even qualify for that.
About 80 kms out of Mildura lie the twin towns of Euston and Robinvale. The G had seen in her guidebook that there is a courthouse at Euston dating from 1880. She saw that Euston had been “proclaimed a town” in the late 1800s. I wondered what was the legal process for the proclamation of a town; we had seen that Silverton had been similarly proclaimed at about the same time. Euston didn’t last long apparently though it still has a population of about 800. The proportion of that population that work must work in one of the 6 grape companies in Euston. There are acres of vines, not for wine but for food, on either side of the road.
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| There is a courthouse at Euston but we did not see it. Here it is in case you are interested. |
We did not visit Robinvale though our travelling companions, terry and Enid, did and found a gallery there but not a lot else. Robinvale is on the other side of the Murray, which river marks the boundary between NSW and Victoria.
It’s another 80 kms to Balranald. As you leave Hay, the sign-posters of Mildura have deemed that the traveller is not interested in Hay. He is interested in Sydney (at 1,000 kms or so) and Balranald. Since few civilised people can have heard of Balranald this is another example of the Australian incapacity for effective signposting. Regular followers of my musings will be aware of my views on this.
About 13 km east of Euston we stopped to look at Lake Benanee which is an endorheic lake. Not many people know what endorheic means (including, I note as I wrote, the Microsoft spell-checker). There is a sign at the lake that provides useful information including not only the fact of the lakes endorheicity (I made that word up) but also a definition, viz. that it is a make that does not have an outflow but loses its water through evaporation. Wikipedia is more forthcoming saying that “An endorheic basin (from the Ancient Greek: ἔνδον, éndon, "within" and ῥεῖν, rheîn, "to flow") is a closed drainage basin that retains water and allows no outflow to other external bodies of water, such as rivers or oceans, but converges instead into lakes or swamps, permanent or seasonal, that equilibrate through evaporation. Such a basin may also be referred to as a closed or terminal basin or as an internal drainage system.”
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| Lake Benannee. An ephemeral and endorheic lake and surprisingly large to be in the middle of nowhere. |
Balranald takes its name from the Balranald on North Uist in the Outer Hebrides. In 1849 the then Crown Lands Commissioner McDonald recommended to the Colonial Secretary that a township be established at the location (it’s on the Murrumbidgee River) and he named it after his birthplace. This man, George James McDonald no less, is so important that he does not have a Wikipedia entry. So, we have something in common.
It was larger than we expected but no more interesting. The G’s guidebook, presented to her by that good woman at the Mildura Tourist Information Centre, said that visitors flocked to have their picture take with the Balranald frog. This seemed like a good thing to do but proved to be an underwhelming experience. We did take coffee and a cake at the Café Cassaro which advertised itself as having the best cakes for miles around. Bearing in mind the immediate locality this claim was probably justified.
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| The Sturt Highway through Balranald. Did these outback towns buy their main streets from a catalogue? |
In fact, I discovered later that The G had acquired an entire tourist booklet on Balranald so perhaps I am being more adversely critical than is justified. I note from this worthy publication that “it is a Balranald tradition to have your photo taken with the frog sculpture outside the Visitor Information Centre.” The same guide book tells us that, though there are many frogs apparently scattered around Balranald, the first ones were made only about 30 years ago. So that’s not really much of a “tradition”. But there you go.
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| The G participating in a well-known Balranald tradition. Well, it may be well-known to some but not to us. And the frog was disappointingly small. |
A little way out of Balranald is Yanga National Park and the Yanga Homestead. We called in at the homestead and we like it greatly. It was build in about 1870 and looks to be pretty much as it was when it was built (with the exception, of course, of the addition of electricity and running water). You could see the remains of the formal garden stretching down to the river. In its day it had been the centre of what amounted to a small township, testament again to the economic significance of sheep to the economy of late 19th and early 20th century Australia. The G reminds me daily that Australia was built on the back of a sheep. Or something like that.
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| Yanga Homestead pretty much as it was in 1870 or so when it was built. |
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| An old tractor. |
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| A very old boiler |
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| An old petrol pump (bowser in Australian). |
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| An old and rustic fence. |
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| A water tank. Probably an old water tank. |
It’s about another 120 kms to Hay from the homestead. The scenery is relative unvarying, that is. It’s flat. There are sheep and cattle and at one point, about 80 kms from hay, we saw a team of folks repairing a fence. How they had known the fence was down and where they came from I cannot say. But there they were. We saw several heaps of road material; heaps of sand. These looked like hills in the distance but turned out to be just heaps closer by. We supposed they were there to provide visual relief to the driver faced with interminable flat scrubland.
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Mildura to Hay: it looked this
pretty much all the way. |
There are also cotton plantations. I have already expressed my concern at the growing of this crop in a land where there is really bugger all water. There were signs that had the name Tandou at the roadside. I discover that Tandou was a land and water company acquired a year or so ago by the walnut producer Webster. We had seen a walnut shelling and export plant outside Mildura so walnuts must be big hereabouts. There is a fascinating paper on walnuts that you could read if you have the energy. I learn from this paper that "walnuts appeal to many ... retirees ... because production is highly mechanised, orchards require low maintenance, are productive for at least 40 years and once harvested, the nuts will keep for two years." I care not. The self-managed super fund will not be investing in walnuts.
We reached Hay and found our accommodation which is a lovely wooden house constructed, we are told, in 1880. We were well fed by Terry and Enid and passed a comfortable night.
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| I meant to see how these towels were folded. |
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| Ah, how quaint. Obviously aimed at the ladies. |
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| Cool fireplace, though. |
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| A ceiling rose. |
