Wednesday, 7 October 2026
Our journey north started yesterday afternoon but it really wasn’t very interesting! With both of us having people to see and things to do during the morning, we weren’t able to leave home until after 3.00pm! And that was OK because this holiday is not a road trip as such, it’s more about the destination, which is the Sunshine Coast. We have an important deadline to meet on Friday. We need to be at Maroochydore Airport to meet a flight arriving from NZ at 10.05am.
So, we left home just after 3.00pm to do battle with the peak hour traffic heading out of Melbourne. The SatNav took us north on St Georges Road through Reservoir and then west on Mahoneys Road to join the Hume Highway in Campbellfield. There was so much traffic heading north out of the city. We were just dealing with it today, we imagine most of the other drivers are commuters who do it every day or at least several times a week.
Eventually the traffic thinned out and Bernie was able to pick up the speed as we motored north on the Hume. At Wangaratta, where the Hume veers a bit north-easterly, we turned onto Federation Way to continue north. We crossed the Mighty Murray at Wahgunyah, arriving in Corowa, NSW soon after. We pulled into the Motel Meneres at 7.14pm. We had rung ahead to say that we would not arrive until after 7.00pm, but found reception still open. We collected our key and headed to our room, stopping in only briefly for a pit stop, because we needed to head straight to the RSL Club to order our meals before the kitchen closed.
We enjoyed a Pork Poké Bowl (me) and a goat curry (Bernie) before heading back to the motel to unload our gear into our room. With no camping and no camp cooking planned for this trip the truck seems very empty! On our two Road Trips earlier in the year the truck has been stuffed to gills, so it’s quite strange to have nothing on the back seat but the sun screen for the front windscreen, my puffer vest and a sun hat. We should be OK to fit Robin and Sandra – and their luggage – in on Friday when we pick them up!
This morning it was only 0.1 degrees when we woke up. Brrr, we turned the heating on to deal with that! When we had to load the car was soon enough to face the cold. With accommodation booked last night for tonight in Narrabri (800 kilometres away), we were up at 6.00am and on the road by 7.45am. When we were loaded and in the truck, the seat warmers were ON.
I opened the Australia Road & 4WD Touring Atlas this morning to follow our route today. It wasn’t long before I said to Bernie that as we were now heading towards Wagga Wagga we might have been better to have spent last night in Albury?? Bernie said he thought Corowa was my choice for our first night. I really can’t recall, but we now found ourselves travelling north-east this morning to pick up the Olympic Highway.
Syri guided us north onto Hopefield Road (although she pronounced it Hop-e-field Road) and then east on Daysdale Road. After a short jink to the left on Urana Road we found ourselves in Walbundrie where we turned right (east) towards Culcairn. Just before reaching Culcairn, we turned north-east onto the Henty-Walla Road, which saw us joining the Olympic Highway at Henty.
We stopped in Henty for a leg stretch at the Headlie Taylor Header Museum commemorating the World’s First Header, an invention that revolutionised the world’s grain industry. Headlie built a machine that could remove grain by cutting off the head, rather than stripping the grain from the plant. This made it possible to save crops affected by storms, weeds or wind. A self-taught engineer, he made his prototypes using his own tools in a blacksmith’s shop. The machine was demonstrated at the 1914 Henty Agricultural Show and went into production in 1916 in H.V. Mackay’s factory in Sunshine, Victoria.
Only 15 Ks up the road we stopped to photograph the painted water tower in Yerong Creek. Oh, no, we’re starting to turn it into a road trip! We really don’t have time to be stopping at too many things, we need to get the kilometres on the odometer. The artwork on the water tower is titled ‘Through Their Eyes’ and tells the story of the town’s past through the eyes of the children with references to the War veterans, the railway, education, sport and agriculture. The artwork was completed by artist, Heesco, in 2021.
We arrived in Wagga Wagga where we made our way to the BP Servo. Bernie’s research on Petrol Spy revealed that this might be our last chance to buy reasonably priced diesel. In fact, with a five cents/litre promotional discount, Bernie reckons we saved 15 cents/litre on what diesel is selling for further north. The truck’s tank was filled. Our bladders were emptied. We changed drivers and continued on our way.
We continued for a short while on the Olympic Highway before turning onto Goldfields Way heading towards Temora. From there we took the Trungley Hall Road before turning onto Euroka Road. Our SatNav is really taking us through the agricultural back blocks today. Next we turned onto Mary Gilmore Way. I said that I thought that Mary Gilmore features on one of our bank notes. Bernie said that he thought that she was probably the president of the local CWA for 50 years! When I had a strong enough phone signal again I Googled that and, yes, Dame Mary Gilmore DBE was an Australian writer, journalist and champion for social and worker’s rights and she features on our $10.00 note.
Anyhow, continuing with our journey, we turned onto the Quandialla-Bimbi Road, before taking Driftway Road to the Mid Western Highway. We were only on the highway for a couple of Ks before the SatNav directed us onto Deaths Lane. As we drove along this single lane road we could not believe how purple the paddocks were, filled with Patterson’s Curse! We continued zigzagging along Sandy Creek Road, Ballendene Road and Wirrinya Road, making our way towards Forbes. Just before we reached Forbes we were held up by roadworks. They have built a MASSIVE grain storage facility so it appears they are upgrading the single lane road to one more suitable for grain trucks to access the facility.
Finally, three Ks south of Forbes, we turned onto the Newell Highway. With all the traffic, especially the heavy vehicles, we encountered back on the highway we were able to appreciate the almost traffic free journey we had made via the rural road network. It was time to eat so we made Forbes our lunch stop. We purchased a couple of extravagantly filled salad rolls from the BakeHouse. We sat at one of their outdoor tables to eat lunch, joining the older couple who had purchased their lunch just ahead of us. Rather unbelievably they were from Warragul. What is with us encountering people from West Gippsland on our holidays this year??? We didn’t know their names but they, of course, knew of Bernie’s parent’s fruit shop.
With Bernie back at the wheel, it was onwards towards Parkes. With roadworks in the vicinity, traffic was reduced to a single lane so we had to wait for an escort vehicle to bring the southbound traffic through from the north, before we could be escorted north. When we reached Telescope Road we turned off to make a quick detour to photograph the Parkes Radio Telescope. We have visited before so we didn’t go in, just took a quick photo of The Dish. Seriously, it’s not a road trip, we have to stop being so touristy!
We made our way straight through Dubbo (been there, done that) and then headed off the highway again, making our way onto the Old Mendooran Road and Mendooran Road to, you guessed it, Mendooran. We crossed the Castlereagh River, then turned right onto the Coonabarabran Road. We passed through Coonabarabran about 5.00pm to start our final push towards Narrabri, now just 118 kilometres further north. This section of our journey passed through the Pilliga Nature Reserve to the east and the Timmallallie National Park to the west. We explored the national park in 2024 when we were returning from our trip to the Gulf of Carpentaria.
It was not quite as late this afternoon when we pulled into our accommodation, at the Club Motor Inn. By the time we topped up the tank with diesel at the BP on the way into Narrabri, it was just coming up 6.30pm when we arrived. Dinner was easy. We popped through the gate at the back of the motor inn to eat at the Narrabri Bowlo. The menu features pub classics and a range of Sri Lankan meals. Tonight I had the Ceylon Hot Plate, while Bernie opted for the Ceylon Noodles.
