We have made it to Coolamon, which is a little north-west of Wagga in southern NSW. After leaving Coonabarabran we overnighted in the Goobang NP. This park is located about 25 km off the Newell Hwy along a gravel road. The road is quite good and we arrived at the camp ground with no dramas except a bit of dust getting stuck to the van after some light rain was encountered along the way. Nothing like the Birdsville dust! There seems to have been a modest amount of rain in these parts with the pastures showing tinges of green and some water accumulating in the dams. Goobang was a good stopover.

A few days old birdy in the John Oxley Caravan Park.

Goobang campground

Tall trees provided a very shady camp area, unfortunately a fire ban was in place despite recent rain. Bush was very dry though with a lot of leaf litter and dead wood lying around. |Some wallabies with young joeys entertained us in the afternoon. Early the next morning we packed up and headed back to the main road to continue south through Parkes, Forbes and Gilgandra to Coolamon.

Overlooking the Western Plains atop Goobang storms had just past by.

Mother and Joey

In Coolamon the six of us are staying in the Kindra Apartments, a renovated old Masonic Lodge. The main room has a great big screen on one wall for movie viewing and we have already  been thoroughly entertained by a re run of the Man from Snowy River. Opinions were also being freely expressed at this time on a range of topical and controversial issues facing the nation. Allthego had some fairly sound and thoughtful opinions but these were countered by those of far looser substance. Allthego did concede though that everyone was entitled to an opinion and could freely express same. No hard cheese.

Kindra Apartments.

A great old cart, eight horses pulled this when laden, in the Coolamon museum.

The highlight of the stay so far has been the Italian Dinner at the Cheese Factory. This was a sold out affair, with I guess something like 70-80 people enjoying the ambience of the location. Prior to dinner we had 5 O’clock nibbles, including some pleasant cheeses from the factory,  and a few reds so the group was in a jovial mood as it headed off at 7 pm on the short walk to the dinner location. As it turned out this was to be what Maree has called ‘a degustation dinner with a difference’. Our two courses were served over a period of close to 3 hours in about 5 separate instalments, 3 of the main meals had been ‘forgotten’. The kitchen it seems was  a little  stretched. Coolamon is a town of 2000 or so people who take great pride in its street scape and community. Some interesting museums and shops line the wide main street. The Cheese Factory seems to be quite busy with customers coming and going. A great recent addition to the town’s attractions. Back at Kindra the gang has entertained themselves around the dinner table with games of 500 and Bananagram, played in a non confrontational way. Winners were always grinners and losers just took it on the chin and did what they pleased.

The gang at 500, an extremely focussed group.

We are off to dinner tonight at one of the local hotels, it will hopefully be tasty traditional pub fare served up with the usual efficiency of such places.

The others leave tomorrow morning to journey home and we will continue south to Glenrowan and a short visit to Baileys for some port.