Judy & Brian Tour Oz

  Roma Qld. July 12th 2023 Before we hit the road today I took an early morning walk up to the artesian bore spa and a had a bit of a soak in the 40°C mineral laden water. Supposed to be good for all manner of kinds of complaints. Always busy, night and day. It's free and you just walk in and jump in the pool. Quite refreshing given that the air temperature was about nothing. I also grabbed a great snap, looking back up the road toward the spa, with the sun shining through the steam coming off the spa and blanketing the road. Steam and fog from the artesian bore spa. Lightning Ridge NSW But then we had to leave and tackle the 420km run up through Hebel, Dirranbandi, St George and on and on up through Surat and on to Roma. Pretty straightforward but a bit tiring. Quite pleased to pull into the Big Rig Van park and have a bit of a chill out.

  Roma, Qld 26 July2022 422km Today’s travel was delayed while I rewired the caravan trailer plug. It’s always the same, you check the lights, as we do every time, and one isn’t working. It’s always the plug and as soon as you open it up it becomes evident that its a wonder anything was working at all! Oh well, did what I needed to do to fix the immediate problem/s and promise to fix it properly... one day. We were taking the back way up to Roma via St George and Surat. But first a very welcome stop after 122km of rough-riding through to Mungindi, right on the border. Actually there are two Mungindi towns, one in NSW and one in Queensland, The town is tiny but had a great coffee shop and bakery. We chatted to a local farmer who said it had only just stopped raining and the rivers were still rising. You would never know, it was a  glorious sunny warm day. We also asked about the pronunciation of the town name, and for you interest it is ‘Mung’, as in mung-bean, ’n’, as in c...

Up and away early from Roma, we have a long drive ahead, some 515km to Clermont. The road north out of Roma isn't brilliant, and gets quite hilly as we cross over the ranges onto the plateau. One thing we noticed was the number of vans travelling south, don't they know its still cold down there? There is one section of 'development' road, which is quite narrow but reasonably smooth and not as daunting as the map makes out. The thing is, there is a lot of not much between Roma and Rolleston, where we stopped after 250km for a rest. Last time we came through here there was next to nothing in this quaint little town, a single short street with a few down-at-heel shops and a park. This time however, the park was sporting a coffee van run by volunteers raising money to beautify the park, and by the look of the park, doing a great job. There was at least twenty vans parked in the street and everyone was waiting for the coffee; and using the loos and checking out the old pos...

Roma, Qld July 26 2017 Transport day, a 425km leg from Lightning Ridge to Roma. After passing through Hebel the next town is Dirranbandi, where we stopped for a coffee and rest. The roads are good enough with the proviso that they can be quite bumpy at times, not pot-holed, just not flat and smooth - you tend to do a bit or porpoising because its hard to tell when the undulations will hit, except for the cattle-grids, of which there are many. Hebel is touted in Lightning Ridge as an attraction, mainly because of the pub and a 'restaurant', and as far as we could see, there wasn't much of anything else. We did see the strangest thing some time out of Hebel. Out there, in the middle of nothing, there was this black and white dog (think Dog from Footrot Flats) sitting on top of a dog-box of sorts, on the side of the road. It was chained to the said dog-box and eagerly awaiting the return of its master. One could only assume it was there for a reason, maybe it was guarding some...

Roma Qld. July 16, 2015 Up early and down to the cattle saleyards to see the country folk at work. Thursday is 'Prime' day, what that means is that these cattle are all heading to the meat works. It was a slow day, only 1600 head going through, but boy do they make some action. It's just so fast and so slick. The cattle are penned into smaller lots - maybe 20 at most in each pen. The Auctioner and circus walk along the high walkway between the pens, the buyers are at cow level on the other side of the pen. You have to listen really close to understand what's going on, but basically, they rattle of the lot number, the type of cattle and the price - in cents per kilo. The buyer is buying the pen lot at a given price per kilo, a weight that is measured later. The sellers. Cattle stockyards. Roma Qld The first bloke is the auctioneer, the next two are the recorders, the bloke with the pole is the 'paint', who makes each beast with the brand of the buyer - ...

Roma Qld July 15, 2015 Drove a leisurely 200 km up to Roma today, stopping at a lovely little town called Surat for a coffee and wander about. Its claim to fame is that it is where the last ever Cobb & Co coach went from, in 1926, and that very coaching change station became a store and various others things before being rescued and turned into the delightful Cobb & Co museum. They have a fully restored C&C 14 person coach, which is much bigger than others that we have seen in other places. Apart from it’s size, it was pulled by 7 horses, in two rows of 3 & 4. The run from Surat to Yaleba about 75km, required 40 horses and 5 grooms and the driver for the one way run. No wonder they caved in to the new wonder of the century, the motor omnibus. Another building of interest is this rather unique looking town hall: Town Hall. Surat Qld Surat Qld Cobb & Co 14 person coack. Surat Qld Ferrier Wool Press. Surat Qld  Surat Qld Cobb & ...