Leaving Sydney mid morning on day 6, we
headed around the city on the toll ways and headed south on the Hume
Highway. We had planned a couple of overnight stops to look at, and maybe stay at,
and although they looked good, we decided to keep going. We ended up
in Gunning and stayed at the show grounds. Gunning has two free
camps, one by Meadow Creek - that was already crowded with vans - and
the show grounds. The show grounds had a lot of grassed areas and
only three vans over night.
Up to 1820, the Gunning area was the
end of settlement from Sydney. The area was occupied by the Pajong
“Fish River Tribe” people. Hamilton Hume explored the area in
1821 and Hume and William Hovell made the route from Gunning to what
is now Melbourne and the first road from Sydney to Melbourne was
established. It became the Hume Highway. Gunning became a travellers
rest stop on the journey. Many colonial buildings still exist. The
main street, Yass Street, has many of these buildings.
Most of the shops are tourist type
shops – cafes, galleries, arts and crafts etc. and most were closed
on the Monday. I suspect that being so close to Canberra it is a
weekend type town were Canberreans would make a day trip.
After a lovely few hours walking around
Gunning, and Peter getting his coffee fix, we headed towards Canberra, though sheep country. These were
at Sutton.
By-passing Canberra we headed around
the A.C.T. And spent the night at Chakola. It was so cold – got
down to minus 4 overnight. We were very glad we have a gas heater AND
a hot water bottle.
The next day, day 8, we continued south
to Cann River, filled up with petrol and headed west to Marlo. We
have been here a few times and there are many rest areas along the
Snowy Mountain River. We have our favourite, and this time there were
no other caravans there – not that we mind having company. I guess
most caravanner’s are heading north to the warm weather, silly us, we
are not!!
We are getting much better at driving a
short total distance each day, and spending more time stopping in the
smaller towns to explore. We are also relaxing more in the mornings
and not leaving places to well after 10am some days. One of the great
things about free and low cost camping!! We headed to Orbost, just up the road
from Marlo, and had a walk up and down the street. First stop was the information centre, in an old slab hut.
The town has information boards along the main street and surrounding streets.
Peter got his
coffee fix, and I found a quilt shop.
We had decided the go only a short distance and stay at Golden Beach, on 90
Mile Beach. We looked at a few camps in the sand dunes, scared a
number of kangaroos, but decided to go to the donation camp in the
town as most of the dune camping was full of rubbish. Some campers
are disgusting, not bothering to take their rubbish with them. The
town camp was lovely. Big sites, clean, and quiet, and one could still
hear the waves crashing on the beach. This was our site.
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