Gill's Blog: On the road To Bourke

After our stay at Broken Hill we head towards Bourke, known mostly as Back of Bourke...... Nothing much west of Bourke is the impression you get but there is, just need a four wheel drive for a lot of it.

We had two nights on the road to get here, mostly because we take our time, morning tea, lunch stops etc. had a great stop at a small town called Wilcannia, which had a lot of shops boarded up but a great little coffee shop, with home made cakes, a real gem

First stop was a rest area on the Barrier Highway, good spot, not to much noise from the trucks, other vans etc and goats, oh yes lots of wild goats, they are on the lookout for water more than food and hung around the toilets and they were around the water pipe on the van when I emptied the sink, don't think Bentley was too keen on them.

Next night we stopped at a rest area 40ks before Bourke, we found that we were getting a few kangaroos around, hoping back and forward over the road, one family stopped in the middle of the road and we had to stop and wait for them to move.... Of course the trucks don't stop, just hit them and you see a lot of dead ones along the way.

We arrived in Bourke Saturday morning and as it was hot we booked into the caravan park so we could have the air conditioning, so good, of course had to do some washing etc, we had a quick trip into town as everything except IGA closed at lunch time. Had a bakery lunch, pies, award winning ones, not sure what award......... and then spent a relaxing arvo, me having a nana nap with the air con on. Nice caravan park, lovely grassed area in the middle with the vans around the outside, found Bourke to be very green in places, obviously have a underground water supply or the Darling River.

Sunday, today we took a walk by the Darling River and found nice coffee at the RSL club, also drove out of town, further down the river where there were some free campsites but very rough tracks, not something we would take the van on. Looked at PV Jandra a replica of the paddle steamer that used the Darling River, it cruises on the Darling twice a day but not on Sunday...

Coffee shop at Wilcannia