SATURDAY AUGUST 22     FORBES TO TOCUMWAL     420kms

This morning, I took Couey for her morning walk, to the back area of the park where John had walked her yesterday. She suddenly made a great lunge away from me, pulled the lead from my hand  and scarfed down something that sounded crunchy. A bone of some sort? She must have noted it, somehow, yesterday, because there was no preliminary investigation this morning. Could only wait and see if whatever it was upset her system. For a cattle dog, with dingo ancestry somewhere back in the breed, her system is remarkably intolerant of a range of things. Very much at odds with the instinct to scavenge.

Left the Forbes park at 8.55am. Wearing long trousers and polo tops now.

I noted for future reference the good looking dog walking areas by Lake Forbes.

Yesterday and today we saw lots of truck loads of hay going north – fodder for drought affected areas, we thought.

Today we were into more irrigated crop land and plenty of sheep and cattle grazing areas. The more arid mulga country was left well behind us yesterday.

Canola

We encountered one of those vanners who speeds as soon as a section of road with overtaking lanes is approached. Grrr. We’d come up behind him fairly quickly – a dead give away that we were going faster than him. We then tootled along behind him, at 70-80kms, for more than 15 minutes, until coming up to the overtaking section, when he suddenly speeded up. We did get past him, but had to use the whole length of a long overtaking section to do so, and just managed it. The, of course, we left him totally behind. Why do drivers feel the need to do that?

The GPS took us around the West Wyalong Truck Route. Very nice of it.

The damned fridge door sprang open again. A chunk of frozen meat fell out when it opened, scaring Couey, who apparently does not like meat airborne. Another quick stop for me to close it. Definitely going to have to install a strap fastener or something, at home.

Took a break at Narrandera, near the Information Centre. Couey had a good run in the park area there. Ate the sandwiches I’d made this morning.

Narrandera

I tried to persuade John that we could stop the night in Narrandera, but he was in get-home-fast mode, it seemed. I phoned the caravan park in Tocumwal, where he decided we’d aim for, and booked us in.

Refuelled in the town. $1.319. Getting steadily cheaper as we come south. My calculations showed we got 7kms to the litre on that tank of fuel. We’d had a tail wind for much of the last two days.

Crossed the Murrumbidgee, which was fairly low.

Stopped for a coffee break at the pleasant Bundure Rest Area. Quite an extensive area, in amongst trees.

Bundure Rest Area

John was tired, now, of course. We should have stopped at Narrandera. I drove the rest of the way to Tocumwal. Arrived at 2.50pm. Not quite such a long day as yesterday.

At the Tocumwal Caravan park paid $36 for an en-suite site, after discount. The site was drive through – a bonus, and we could keep the car on the back. The en-suite was adequate, but a fairly flimsy transportable unit, so starting to show wear and tear. It was almost impossible to get the door to close, for example.

This park had a dog run area, fenced, where dogs could run off lead. It was not a huge area, but long and narrow, along the side fence, an area that would otherwise just be lawn and garden. The run was clean too – a bin was provided inside. We could throw the ball for Couey and she could gallop around. This was an excellent facility and I wished more caravan parks would adopt it.

Dog run at Tocumwal caravan park

John napped for the rest of the afternoon. The dog too, after her first, long gallop about.

I walked to the shops in the main street and found an IGA supermarket that had the Saturday Age and Weekend Australian. Wonderful! My reading matter for the rest of the day and night.

I cooked John fish and fries for tea. I was not very hungry – the effect of long travel days, so just had a few fries and an egg.