Travelog for: Toothy Walrus

Next stop is Wellington... it's a small town of around 4,500 inhabitants. Since it was still very early we decided to just pass by instead of getting what we had to do done here... so moving on through... here are some photos driving through the town...





As you can see it's a pretty small town... as we were coming out of the town we actually saw a train it wasn't long before the train was way behind us... ah well it was cool while it lasted... moving onto the much larger town ahead... write soon!

Next stop was the much larger town of Dubbo. Dubbo is closer to the outskirts of the real "outback". There's a lot more red dirt, and you've got a very large zoo called the Western Plains Zoo which is has a huge breeding program for African animals since the weather is very similar here to African weather patterns. It gets *very* hot during the Summer... here are some photos driving through Dubbo...



...Sadly we weren't able to spend much time in Dubbo, we still had so much to do outside of Dubbo... and we had a few more hours of driving. Sara apologizes that we didn't do anything really interesting today... but we got to see a lot of the area she lives in... it's very beautiful but so very dry... we're on the road again, it's time to get to our next destination...

...to get to our next destination we had to pretty much drive all the way back into Orange... to a small town called Molong... this town is *tiny* it has a small population of only 2,000 - it's one of those towns where if your not looking you're already through it... but we got a few photos whilst we were driving through...



...it wasn't long and we were back to a very farmy landscape... it never felt like it was going to end...



...but it did end... but only for a short time... write again soon!

...an hour outside of Molong... was an even smaller town, Sara hadn't ever driven through this area of the Central West... but it was a very small town called Cudal... it only has a population of just under 400 people... crazy crazy small...


...just outside of Cudal was this horrendous smell and a lot of smoke... we were all wondering what was up. We knew it had been very hot lately with very little rain (even for Autumn)... and then we saw it...

...at some point in the day there must have been a large grass fire on this persons property. It was still smoking, and it was all gone... everything... the smell was pretty intense... makes you wonder what it was like during the Black Saturday Victorian bush fires this year... that smell would have been horrible to deal with!

Last stop for today, and it was only 2pm... can you believe we've made this much of a mark on the map today in just a few hours? Well, you can be assured we are tired as hell!... here's the last stop for the day... a small town called Canowindra a population of only 1,500 but it no doubt looks a lot smaller than Molong, which has like 500 more people... crazy huh?


Sara and Daniel have only been here once before... and they went to the Age of Fishes Museum... there's a lot of information and fossils there about the ancient fishes that were found in Canowindra... very interesting!


Sadly we were all too tired, so we got a few photos of us and the main street and then headed home... it had been very long day for everyone... especially the people... :-P




Well sorry there wasn't too much to see or do today... there's more to come... apparently we're going somewhere awesome on Saturday... you'll see when it happens... write again soon!

Today we went on another road trip to Abercrombie Caves... Sara enjoys going to caves, but this time she was able to take the toyvoyagers along... sadly she wasn't allowed to really take photos of the toyvoyagers within the caves. So Sara took a photo of us on the road to Abercrombie Caves... here I am, it's very full of eucalyptus trees isn't it? Very pretty...


...and we're finally here... feels like we've been on the road forever!


Very quickly once we got through the entrance we saw a whole bunch of animal crossing signs, these are the main ones though, so kangaroo and wombat crossing... I wonder if we'll see anything... it's a very twisty road, we've got to be very careful, it's a very dangerous road...


Thankfully we got down safely and got our tickets to do a tour in one of the caves called the 'bush rangers cave'... you can read about that cave and the history of the ribbon gang right here. The ribbon gang hid out in the caves for about 10 days before being captured and eventually hanged (because of horse theft and murder)... it's a very interesting read about the cave... but we came out of the office and saw this strange sign... there must be a lot of kangaroos in this area...


Sadly we didn't see any kangaroos at all - there was a lot of people camping, Sara thinks they might have scared the kangaroos into the bush having so many people around... oh well, we did see lots of ducks and cockatoos though...



Now we're just waiting in line to get into the caves... we're just waiting for the tour guide... quick! It's starting to rain really hard on us... thankfully for us only the people got wet, we were all in Sara's bag so we didn't get lost...



Finally we're in the caves... here are some pictures Sara took within the main self-guided tour archway cave... we had to walk through this cave to get to the bush rangers cave...





This is the exit of the archway self-guided tour cave... and just around the corner is the main cave we're getting the tour through... but something interesting is this is what is called the "grand arch" it's the largest grand arch in the Southern Hemisphere... even more interesting is we are 500m under the ground right now... how often are you that far under the ground, and can still see sunlight? Pretty crazy right? Well onto the bush rangers cave...




Now we're finally in the bush rangers cave... there are a lot of very small passage ways and there was an area in the caves where there was quite a number of bats... here's the "bat chamber"...

See how on the left side of the photo the rock is very dark? Well, that's where the bats are most often... so there's a lot of... bat poo there... we actually had one fly quite low near Sara's head... but weird enough out of the 50 people around Sara she was the only one that seemed to notice it... crazy huh?

Moving on there's a few more things to see in here...





Then we had to make our way back through the main cave we went through initially and then went back to the car... quickly after the tour we didn't take too many photos. Sara was just trying to stay as dry as possible (or keep her camera as dry as possible) as it was pouring down rain at that point... time to head home...

Something interesting on the way home... we saw an echidna... it was on the side of the road in the long grass... sadly Sara couldn't stop and get photos since it was a very narrow road and it was wet out... so sadly no photos of him... Sara wanted photos quite badly since she'd never seen a wild echidna before. :-) Well, write again soon... tomorrow is Easter down here! :-)

I just wanted to wish you a very happy Easter Sunday!

Well... we all took a road trip to Bathurst. We got a call today saying that we were going to be taking a long road trip in a few days (when we were going to go to Bathurst)... so we pushed our trip here sooner... first things first, Sara always searches for kangaroos since she knows the places that they frequent on the outskirts of the town... so... lets see if we can find any of those famous Australian animals...


Next thing you know... we were there, and there were some kangaroos... just sitting on the side of the road. Sara got us in a photo before she got some close up photos. They weren't all that close to us... here I am with the kangaroo in the distance...


...and of course Sara got some close up photos of the kangaroos... there was a large male there as well, you'll notice him out of the bunch when those photos come along...







But that wasn't the last stop in Bathurst... this town has a much more famous thing in it... something that all Australian's know about and it makes this country stop when it's on... let's move onto the next stop... write again soon! :-)

Next stop was the very famous Australian race track... Mount Panorama... this is the race track that holds the famous Bathurst 1000 each October. For one full weekend the city is absolutely booming, people come from all over Australia to see the races... so we got to visit the track... here's us on the way to the track... if you see in the background on the side of the mountain you can see the writing? See it mom?...


I'm sure the sign was a bit hard to see, since we were still quite a distance from it... here we are at the entrance to the track...


...but before we go on the track we got to visit the new statue of Peter Brock which was introduced last year at the races. Mr Brock was famous for winning more times than anyone on the track... sadly he died in 2006, in a car crash, on a different track... very shortly after Steve Irwin died... within days. Here I am in front of his statue...


Sara decided to take us up to a higher level to see the race track from above... sort of... here I am in front of the sign you might have been able to see some of earlier... it's the very famous 'Mount Panorama' sign on the side of the mountain...


...and of course we had to check out the starting gate... we had to see where we were headed...


There aren't many race tracks open to the public. Nor are there many race tracks where you can drive on them, or have to drive on the track to get to your home... some people live on the track (on the inside ring of the track there's vineyards and quite a few little houses that people rent out during the races)... well... what are we waiting for, let's see what this race track has to offer...

















Now we have been able to see the whole track as it is, you can see the view from the top of the mountain... isn't it beautiful? Well I better get home and get some rest... Sara says we'll need it for what's coming up! Write again soon!

*yawn* It's 6am, and we are already on the road... were leaving Orange now... Sara's keeping quiet of where were going... it's a big surprise to all of us, although it's mainly just a long drive for us we might get to see some fun things... well here we are, leaving Orange just as the sun is coming up...

Lots more to see... write again soon! :-)

We've already been on the road for 2 hours... it's a place Sara's never even been before, a small town out West of her called Parkes... it's a town with only around 11,000 inhabitants but it's the largest town we'll see for the rest of the day...


We got to see what Parkes is famous for... it's radio telescope...


Can you see it? It's pretty big at 64 meters wide... but obviously it's still a bit of a distance away, you can see it slightly over the trees... you'll see it a lot better soon...


...and finally here we are... isn't it massive?


I don't think the picture gives it the justice it deserves... it's amazing how huge it is... apparently this radio telescope actually helps with NASA, and helped with the Apollo 11 Moon Landing in 1969. The famous transmissions with the voice of Neil Armstrong came through here, before being transmitted to Houston... isn't that awesome?

Sadly we couldn't stay long, so we just got some photos around the front area of the museum... here I am on top of the world... what toyvoyager can say they've done that?



...and here I am on a sun dial... I'm not quite sure how it works but it is cool to look at isn't it?...


Well we quickly had to get back to the car and get on our way... we had another 2 hours to our first destination... I'm thinking this is going to be a long day... but a good start! I can't wait to see what else I'll get to see! Write again soon! :-)

Next stop was a small town called Condobolin... this town has around 3,500 people in it, but honestly it looked a lot smaller than that... we struggled in this town, we couldn't find a place that sold the fuel we need for the car. So we had a bit of a panic attack before finding someone that sold it... thankfully... here we are on the outskirts of Condobolin...


Throughout this tiny town there was a lot of huge trees, it was actually quite pretty... very dry and warm but it was very pretty... here are a few pictures from around the town...




...and this is us when were filling up the tank... we were so happy to find fuel, we would have been lost in the middle of nowhere and that would have been even worse... and you'll see why soon...



...it's time to get back on the road... so much more to see, and the most interesting of it is coming up! I promise you'll enjoy this next bit... I know I did! :-) Write again soon!

Now we were on a long stretch. Sara said this would last a while so we all got pretty comfortable and laid back... it was a nice smooth road, this was going to be nice...


Just as we got confident about the ride... the road went from this wonderfully paved road...

...to this... for 100 kilometers (62.5 miles)... it was a very bumpy ride...


So throughout the ride we decided to just watch out for wildlife... see if we could see anything... sadly we didn't see anything... and then... what did we see in the trees...

We saw an emu! A wild emu... how cool is that? Sara had the car turned around so we could get a few photos. Sadly he was at such a distance that we couldn't really get any photos "with" him...

Moving on we just watched the landscapes, if we're lucky we can see something more... I'm surprised I got to see an emu as it is... how amazing, Sara's never seen an emu in the wild before... here's the landscapes that we were driving by for the 2.5 hour drive up this road to our next destination...





...and then all of a sudden... we saw more emu's... wow this is getting crazy... this guy was on the side of the road...

...he was really really scared of the car so he stayed back and tried to get on the other side of the fence, we had to over take him in hopes he didn't hurt himself trying to get past the fence... he was fine thankfully...

...then almost just as we passed that one we saw another group of emu's... this time there was 10 of them all together...

...they all got startled quite easily and took off running farther into the paddock so Sara got some photos of that...


Sara got to see two other groups of emu's with at least 10 birds in each group... Sara even got a video of the emu's if you'd like to see it check it out here it's only 15 seconds long... they're very curious birds aren't they? I think I'm starting to enjoy seeing them... they get more and more interesting as time goes on... :-)

Finally we were at the end of the 2 hours on that dirt track, no more emu's... although we came into something very common in the "outback"... farmers letting their cattle out of the paddock to graze on the side of the road... we had to be very careful...




Just after that we were finally coming into the next town... write again soon! That was such an interesting ride through the "outback"... we even passed by the center mark in New South Wales... it means we got exactly to the center of the state... how crazy is that?

Next stop was a town called Nyngan it's a town with only around 2,000 people but looked surprisingly bigger than the last town we were in that had another 1,500 people in it... go figure...

It was only a short trip through the city so here are a few photos on the way through...





Well, we're moving onto the next small town... thankfully we're almost done, we've been on the road now for 8 hours! Crazy stuff! Write again soon!

Next stop was Narromine a small town outside of Dubbo (around 45 minutes drive from Dubbo)... sadly we didn't have much time to spend there so we got some photos on the road... it was already a long way home and we've already been driving for so many hours today!



Next stop is the last stop before going back home to Orange! Yay!