Here ends our outback adventure, I will be back perhaps next week with another adventure. I do hope you have been enjoyin g them as much as I have.
Swan Hill – Melbourne 337 kms 3.5 hours
Our last day, so we treated ourselves to a small sleep in and rose late, visited the Pioneer Settlement again to see what was missed the day before. We ran into many of our friends who had not managed to visit the settlement, day before. We had a fun horse drawn carriage ride around the old town and then bid goodbye to our friends and Swan Hill. We stopped at a few spots on our way to Bendigo; Lake Boga, Bridgewater and a few others.
We were going to spend one more day touring and spend the night in Bendigo, but ended up cutting our tip short, due to expansive severe storms heading that way. Crossing the Great Dividing Range we literally passed from clear blue skies with fluffy white clouds into black skies and turbulent winds. Massive thunderstorms threatened us with lighting in the distance and huge dust storms. Areas reported hail and torrential rain, we made it home just before the rains hit. We received a months worth of rain that evening!
All in all, it was a wonderful trip, amazing scenery, wonderful weather, good friends and far too much sitting (long stretches in the car) and so much dust! One good thing about the storms…washed most of my car clean 🙂 (Still took Hubby over 4 hours to clean it!)
We had not even edited all the photos yet and everyone has been excitedly discussing where we should go for our group trip next year! I need to get over this one first, I still have a very full month ahead of me too.
So we did Melbourne – Maldon – St Arnaud – Mildura – Broken Hill – Silverton – Mungo – Swan Hill – Melbourne………2,490kms of mostly dirt road. I have no idea how much fuel, I didn’t think to keep a total. And you know what I just realised? Apart from fuel and food…I did not spend a cent! No shopping, what a good girl am I 🙂
Personal Highlights for me had to have been Silverton and Mundi Mundi Plains, as well as Menindee Lakes, I did enjoy Mungo immensely and just the open road and open country side; I love the Australian Outback, almost as much as I love the open water. I just didn’t realise til I was out there how much. I felt a sense of calm and bliss, at no stage did I feel stressed or anxious. As much as it was tiring and lots of travel I came home completely relaxed and happier than I have been for months.
Til our next adventure (very, very soon) safe travels and happy snapping…oh and our next trip? We are heading for the ocean again, this time out past Gippsland, but more on that in a week or two.
~ Julz
Julie Powell - Photographer & Graphic Artist 