24th February 2012
Packed up from Mudgee, we found that people have kept to themselves a lot more here than on the coast, you say hello to someone and they just about jump out of their skins. I said hello to a guy in the bathroom and I think he shat himself, he said hello and then did not move or make a sound until I left.
We were asked where we were heading today and I couldn’t actually give them an answer other than we are heading north. We decided to plug in Tamworth into the Sat Nav and see where it took us. Immediately we were heading in a different direction to what I had expected but who am I to argue with a Sat Nav? We ended going back through Gulgong and onto Dunedoo which was a slight deviation to the instructions but what the heck. Dunedoo is an aboriginal word meaning Black Swan.
A small town established in 1925 with very impressive metal statues of birds native to the area, only one pub remains and plenty of shops closed.
Just on lunch time we drove through Coolah and onto the ‘Black Stump” where we stopped for lunch at the picnic area. In the 1830s anything west of this point was known as “beyond the Black Stump” The original Black Stump and the pub “The Black Stump Wine Saloon” were destroyed by fire in 1908.
After a beautiful lunch we packed up and headed to the koala capital of the world Gunnedah. We stopped at the information centre to gather information about the town and not only did we not find one koala we did not find too much else either other than the burial place of “Red Kangaroo”, an aboriginal red chief also known as “Cumbo Gunnerah” a revered warrior of the Gunn-e-darr people.
The day was flying so we had to find somewhere to pull up and came across Lake Keepit, it is a State Forest about 65km west of Tamworth. We pulled up about 10 metres from the water’s edge looking west across the water, the sunset was amazing. This is real bush camping with cows and flies and the smell of fresh manure but it so relaxing we have made our minds up that we are here for 2 nights. The sunrise here is just as spectacular as the sunset is. Just beautiful.
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