Kosciuszko NP | Time to ACT

The next day dawned clear and blue again. This time however there are a few clouds in the sky. A sign that the weather was due to change, but it didn’t really matter. Today was a transit day and we needed to get out on the road. We were aiming for Eden because that was where Stuart wanted to go to. But we didn’t want to go there the easy way. We wanted something more interesting.

When the flasks were full, the roof tent down and everything packed and ready to go, there was one last thing to do. Fill up the fresh water. A lot of these sites don’t have fresh water, well actually they don’t have water full stop. This one had an old concrete tank at the top of the hill which collected rainwater from its roof. And there was a tap at the bottom. More importantly, with no one else around, it was easy to get Serenity up to the tap to fill the fresh water up. After all, our fresh water was rain water…

The water tank is at the top on the left, in the shade.

Then we were back in the land of boring roads, smooth, fast and straight and we knew the scenery all too well.

Lunch was had at the raw food Cafe in Cooma. We both had some delicious tortilla type wrap filled with “feta” and spinach that I forgot to photo! But deserts were photographed.

The chocolate caramel slice (all dairy free) was excellent. Stuart had the pear and vanilla slice.

Some supermarket shopping was then done and Serenity also needed feeding (LPG and petrol) and we were ready to get on our way once we decided on a route to take.

Eden was the destination, but we were not to make it that day. When browsing over the paper maps when we first arrived in Australia, I had spotted a major highway in the mountains that wasn’t sealed. It had intrigued me ever since and we decided to do it. I can confirm that it hasn’t been sealed yet. It probably won’t be. And it would be an awful road to drive in the school holidays. But right now, it was a lovely clear blue sky day, windows down, wind in your hair type day… oh and a mouthful of dirt. Forget the windows down idea…

Yep, that’s more like it.

We’ve learnt that whenever there is a lookout, is worth stopping because all you’ll have seen up to this point will be trees. If you want a view and some literature to read whilst someone else heads off into those trees (you can just make out the roof of the composting toilet… ) you need to stop at these lookouts.

Ok, now for the view. I’ll point out that every stretch of road you can see in the entire photo was road we were to soon drive. There were no other roads, only the one ahead of us.

Yep, even that road over on the right… Don’t ask me how we got there but we did.

It’s not a bad view is it?

I got bored waiting…

But it appears that Stuart had similar ideas only he felt like being more creative.

After that, it was glimpses of views and stopping on bends to have a good look.

It was actually a great road to drive even if the info sign saying that the next fuel was in 160km was a good reminder of what you were getting yourself into. Somewhere along the way life changed to Victoria from NSW. Nothing much changed of course.

(cont…)

After a couple of days where neither of us had felt particularly well, we were finally packed and ready to go. It had taken a lot of effort and Stuart, sadly, had been left to do all of the packing, but we were ready. The chickens had been taken care of and we were ready.

I got to the end of the track and automatically pulled to the right to check the letterbox. There was something but it turned out to be just another medical appointments and not another birthday card for an upcoming big birthday.

A big voice piped up saying where were we going? I had assumed that given the gas tank was empty and we needed one or two items from Woolies that we were going to the right. No, I guess because I’d made that decision it influenced a certain birthday person and we were to head off to the right, into Gunning to the Merino Cafe for lunch. We know they will make me a vegan lunch and they have a dairy free dessert, so we were sorted.

There could be photos but I’m not sure. However, the menu hasn’t changed so it’s likely that most readers have already actually seen the food and don’t actually need a photo. However, Stuart had the vegetarian frittata which was deep, layered and topped with sweet potato mash. I got the standard roasted vegetables in a toasted wrap. It’s very tasty but it’s my only option and it’s getting a little boring now.

After lunch we headed onto the Hume Highway and south west towards Melbourne. Our next stop was to be at a roadside cafe (excellent vegan options and always seem to be adding new ones onto the menu). A change of driver followed and before long we headed off the highway and onto the Snowy Mountains Highway. We were to pop into the Yarrangobilly Caves Visitor’s Center to establish it was too late in the day to take a dip in the thermal pools, so we headed off to make camp. Yarrangobilly Village camp was dismissed because we had driven through the middle of it (literally) and it was busy. So we headed off down a dirt road I had long been trying to go down. The first camp we decided against, again it was busy and we thought we could get a quieter camp. We had a few others we could investigate but we decided on Ghost Gully for our first night. When we got there, there was 1 other set of people and their horses, ideal. That was it.

The camp was ideal. No drinking water (very common but not a problem), toilets, BBQ sites and plenty of places to tether a horse or two.

This camp also had a road through the middle of it and you had to cross the road for the other set of toilets. The first set were being hogged by the horse people. But the road was best described as “quiet”. In the morning, we were to venture that way.

But for tonight, this was our “new” tent.