Here, There and Everywhere - Travelling West - Part 1

We had good friends from Queensland visit in November, so we set off in a convoy of two caravans to head west to areas they had not previously visited.

Check out the size of this wide load we saw in Orange.  We were pleased we were travelling in a different direction to where it was going.

There were lots of crops ready to harvest.

Our first stop was “Escort Rock”.  This was the site of the largest ever goldfields theft in Australia.  It is another place we have driven past on several occasions, but never stopped at.  The rock itself is on private land, so you can only view it from afar.  You can read the story of the bushranger robbery that took place here.

From here we continued into the small town of Eugowra.  The streets were lined with jacaranda and silky oak trees.  They looked so good.  Neither tree grows here, as we are too cold.

Eugowra is still recovering from the severe flooding it received two years ago.  We popped into the craft shop, grabbed a coffee and enjoyed a picnic lunch.

We made a few purchases at the craft shop.  What a great initiative for someone to sell hand cut set of fabric in various sizes.  I thought I’d give this 10 inch set a go.

Our plan was to have a walk around looking at the many murals in the town, but a storm was brewing, so we kept on our way.  We ended up driving through quite a bit of torrential rain.

The day’s destination was Forbes, where we free camped beside Lake Forbes, in the middle of town, for two nights.  We have stayed there before and it is a beaut place to camp.

We spent the afternoon wandering beside the lake and checking out the town.    The lake looked beautiful in the late afternoon light.

I may have found some treasures in the op shops.  In Vinnies there was one month’s instalment of a Sue Daley BOM, including two packets of EPP papers and a bobbin on 80wt thread for $2.  Very happy with that.  The rest came from the Salvos.  Nice yardage fabric at $1 per metre and the Thimble-Its.  I’ll talk about them more at another stage.

The second day dawned fine, so it was breakfast in the sunshine.  I love my 1970s table cloth.

We just spent the day playing the tourist around Forbes and having a lazy afternoon back at camp.

The cemetery has some interesting graves, the most famous being the bushranger Ben Hall.  He also carried out his bushranging around Bathurst.

Several of his well known fellow bushrangers are also buried in the cemetery in unmarked graves.

For a small town, there are quite a few famous pioneers buried here.  Another is Kate Kelly, Ned’s sister.

It is just interesting wandering around seeing all the beautiful headstones.

Back in town, we wandered around the town square, seeing some of the beautiful old buildings.  Forbes was founded on the back of the gold rush, which resulted in such beautiful architecture.

This mural was on the side of a shearing business.

Back at our camp site we enjoyed watching the dragon boat teams in training,

After a very hot day, we were treated to a still night with a full moon.  

After dinner, Mick and I went for a walk around the lake.  Come along with us.

The perfect way to end the day.