Day 14 - Bethungra Dam to Koorawatha (119km)
Today was all about timing - and weather!
The day dawned hot and windy at Bethungra Dam. We had worried the wind would affect our ability to have a fry up, because Sunday mornings are fry-up breakfasts! But nothing an induction cooktop, an airfryer and an indoor gas cooktop couldn't fix - doesn't really sound like camping, does it?! So we enjoyed our breakfast and contemplated what to do. The wind was coming from the direction we needed to go in so we knew that would impact fuel consumption. Rain and thunderstorms were forecast for hundres of kilometres north of us. But we didn't really want to stay where we were because it was on top of a hill and a bit too close to trees. so we bit the road a bit after 10am, with the view that we'd stop when the weather got bad.
Cootamundra was our stop for elevenses. It was still pretty hot although the wind was less vigorous there than where we'd come from. We enjoyed our elevenses in the park where the Cricket Captains Walk was. Now this was very well done - bronze bust sculptures of every Test Captain since the beginning in a walk around a life size statue of Bradman batting, because Cootamundra is the birthplace of Don Bradman. Now this is a much more interesting reason to visit Cootamundra than my childhood visits here - to see stallions at horse studs. Apparently not even a good enough incentive for my cricket mad brother though (because he is undoubtedly still scarred from our childhood visits).
Not long after we left, we had the first rain drops on the windscreen. We had identified a few potential camp sites to pull off into if the weather got too bad, but we made it to here at Koorawatha with black skies to the west of us. We got into position at the Showgrounds literally just as it started to rain. And boy did it storm. Thunder, lightning and torrential rain - we were so glad we were off the road.
A bit of lunch, some reading and housekeeping and then the skies cleared so we though we'd go for a walk - also because we had to pay our camp fees at the pub. We did get a few more drops of rain fall on us but we got to the pub unscathed and amused ourselves watching the Sunday Euchre Championship underway. The pub was formerly known as the Bang Bang Hotel (established in 1894) and "famous" for a failed hold up by renowned bushranger Ben Hall. After our beer and perhaps snobbish conclusion that this pub was not for us, we went for a walk around town. There are absolutely no shops or anything left - just lots of empty buildings and some historic houses. Population last census was 450.
The rain cleared in the late afternoon so we emerged feeling optimistic we could have drinks and nibbles by the fire, and maybe even dinner. As the evening wore on, the skies darkened considerably to the west and the BOM radar showed heavy rain and thunderstorms by 8:10pm. We finished our dinner, and sat spellbound by the amazing thunder and lightning show all around us - until the rain really did start and we retrated indoors again. What a show!
(despite the hundreds of photos I took, I couldn't manage one with the lightning in it!)
1 Comments:
Garry and I were thinking of you when the storm hit. It was wild in Canberra too. Glad the whole team are unscathed. We’re sorry to hear the festival is cancelled too.
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