Days 13-18 (Cobar - Wilcannia - Broken Hill - Yunta: Wiljakali - Ngadjuri Country ) 19/5/2022

Day 13: The downside about free camping is that it isn't always in an ideal spot. Sunday morning proved that this was the case for our Rest Area stop in Cobar with mine shift change time around 6 am.  The noise of a huge number of trucks and cars that passed by the eastern entrance to town was enough to get me out of bed for sunrise. That was a bonus!

 

After having done a few chores around town, we headed off to try and find an installation Pete had read about, designed by architect Glenn Murcutt, the Cobar Sound Chapel. The concept of building a music installation within an old water tank is incredible (concept by Georges Lentz) and it was a great experience listening to the Noise String Quartet playing rather other-worldly music in a sound cube built inside the open water tank. Also, it was great to be able to walk around this but still be within the water tank, appreciating the incredible patina of aged iron while listening to the slightly eerie music in the background.  Apparently last week's Compass had a story about this Sound Chapel.

 

 

We also decided to try our luck with the road out to Mt Grenfell, even though we'd been told the day before that the road wasn't open.  Fortunately it was. Mt Grenfell is an historic site run by National Parks with a large amount of aboriginal rock art and a wonderful 5km walk. The top of Mt Grenfell is about 330m above sea level and you get a wonderful view from the top.  We saw quite a few groups of emus on the road in - they really have no road sense.  

             

Water in the creeks                        Beautiful rock weathering

Overnighted on the MacCulloch Ranges in a rest area.  Very peaceful except for the very occasional truck roaring past.  A moth trap and trunk watch yielded some interesting moths and bugs.  See the attached link. MacCulloch Ranges Moth Trap and Tree Trunk Spotting

Day 14:  First stop, Wilcannia and our one and only view of the Darling River lined with beautiful river gums. One day, we'll travel along it from start to finish. Nothing much was open in town but we had a look at some of the beautiful old sandstone buildings, read some of the history, and had our morning tea. 

Checked the roads again - still none open so officially gave up on our Darling River Run for now and moved onwards to Broken Hill on our new itinerary heading towards SA and hopefully out of rain. In Broken Hill we decided to base ourselves a little out of town (and reception) at the Living Desert State Park, a nature reserve of about 2400 hectares run by Broken Hill Council. After setting up we headed to The Sculptures, which sit atop the highest peak within the Park. Artists (not necessarily sculptors) from around the world have created works from Wilcannia Sandstone that are set off against the incredible backdrop of the Broken Hill landscape. Another art exhibition is held by nature itself, with the rocks from which the hill is made being sculptural in themselves.  This park is known for star viewing, but with a full moon we had to appreciate sundown and moonrise.

           One of the natural rock 'sculptures'

Day 15: Headed out to Silverton to explore the 'Original Outback' town as it has branded itself. A mining town before Broken Hill was, Silverton still hosts a handful of 19th century cottages and public buildings, a number of galleries and museums (many of which were closed) and of couse the Mad Max Museum and the Silverton Hotel.  Yes, we did have a beer there. We had decided to go on a tour down the Day Dream Mine, which is about 20mins drive out of Silverton, so calculated that we had time to do the 'Town Walk' before.  The best part of this walk is along the creek bed, which is lined with beautiful River Red Gums. If you go to Silverton, don't bother with the rest of this walk.

Silverton Hotel - in lots of movies

Mad Max Museum

Outside one of the closed galleries

              

              Beautiful River Red Gums and unusually, a bit of water in the Umberumberka Creek

Day Dream Mine was an experience.  Such a remote place, and yet this silver mine operated for 101 years, only closing in 1983.  In the early days life must have been so tough. The nearest water was about 5 miles away - the women had to go by cart and collect this every day. Children as young as 8 were down the mines. By the time they were 15 some were so ill with miner's lung disease and blindness that they had to work above ground but here the heat would have killed them. Few lived past 45. They pulled steam engines from Adelaide by bullock team or horses to the mine across stony, unforgiving land.  Utterly mad. The only concessions to tourism in the mine are safety (all props have been tested heaps and the dust is mitigated regularly with spraying), the handrail and head torches instead of the candles or lanterns they used when actually mining. Even so, you have to walk backwards bent over double in places to access the corridors (or 'drives').

 

Day 16: In the morning, we set out to do the combined 5 km Flora and Fauna and Cultural Walks in the Living Desert Park. The Flora and Fauna walk is within an exclosure where they are keeping feral pests out - so far so good. A beautiful walk and quite informative both about the flora and fauna and aboriginal heritage in the area. One particularly noteworthy part is a sculpture where young aboriginal students at TAFE created their own Story Poles to express what they feel is important to them about their culture. It is quite amazing that any physical remnants of ancient aboriginal life have survived given that apparently in the early days of the Broken Hill mine there were no trees left within a 50km radius of the centre of town.  All timber was used to fire furnaces and for heating/cooking houses.  It wasn't until the 1930s that someone decided that regeneration needed to happen for the health of the inhabitants!  Even then, the first plants they tried were from overseas.  It was not long before they realised that the local flora produced much better results in regeneration!

 Some of the flora and fauna on the track

In the afternoon, we headed into town to vote and sightsee.  We headed up to the top of the famous slag heap to view the relatively new Miners' Memorial,  built to remember the many who have died mining in Broken Hill.  It is a beautiful structure. Also, enjoyed the view from the top.

Many of these old mining relics will one day line the paths around the memorial and a pretty spectacular cafe up on the heap.

There are still many old buildings that remain from early last century and we spent time wandering around town looking at them and generally checking out the lay of the land. 

       

There were a few signs from days gone by too.

No Senior Citizen Club for you here

A moth trap for a brief period at night yielded some interesting critters. Living Desert State Park Moth Trap

Day 17: Rest day.  With Pete's cold lingering and both of us in need of time out from sightseeing, we decided a rest day was in order. I spent some of the morning doing my thing with the camera.  Check out this link if you are keen on bugs and plants! Living Desert Flora and Fauna  I was particularly excited to find the life cycle of a butterfly on view just above the campsite.  From eggs, to newly hatched nymphs, through to hatching and mating butterflies.  Having never really watched caterpillars hatch before, this was a bit of a thrill. I'm pretty sure they are the Belenois java butterfly.

From this ..

... to this ...

... and this. The first thing they eat is eggshell.

 Then they start on the leaves of Native Orange                                                                                              (Capparis mitchellii - I think)

 

On another bush, chrysalises were hatching. Not all ever make it.

Day 18: We farewelled Broken Hill today, but not after trying to visit the historic Mosque Museum (closed), the main Heritage Museum (closed when we got there) and visiting the 'mmm' how shall I say it nicely, 'interesting' Silver City Mint and Art Centre. A bit too twee for my liking although there were some nice pieces of jewellery if that is what one was after.  Its centrepiece is the world's largest canvas painting.  I'll leave you to imagine a work 100m long of the Broken Hill AND northern NSW landscape. Camping tonight at Yunta on main road to Adelaide.  Good tucker at one of the three roadhouses here, apparently ...

In one of the rest areas west of Broken Hill.  I was excited, but it needs more custom and all my books were packed away.  Only magazines and tourist brochures.

 We have reached the plains and are in SA.