The rain continues to follow us around, which keeps the locals happy, but red dirt and water simply turn to sucky, boggy mud. Even a few mm closes almost all the unsealed roads – the shire councils don’t care so much if you get yourself bogged, but they do care that you mess up their roads. So, leaving Cunnamulla (nothing to report) and heading due south, we stayed on the blacktop. Our plan was to go to Bourke then towards Menindee down the Darling River on dirt roads and free camp on the banks. New plan required!

We stopped at Kidman’s Camp just outside Bourke (flat, grassy site, washing/drying machines which we gave a workout👍), bought some supplies and had the pleasure of choosing my beer brand through a small hole in a sturdy wire cage – felt like Canada! There were plenty of indications that thievery was a feature here. Later conversations in Broken Hill were scathing about both Bourke and Wilcannia!

Back on the black, and with new plans, we put in a big day’s drive (430km – completely manageable) through Cobar and on to Warrawong on the Darling outside Wilcannia. Pretty ordinary facilities but “camped by a billabong” and not in town so👍. Cobar looked a great little town with nice parks and shops plus an excellent miners’ memorial and some memorabilia (is junk too judgy?).

Of interest to no-one but me, we returned to our van to find another TORUS branded caravan parked behind us! Its owner, Chris, was so excited to see his first TORUS “in the wild” that he had raced his rig around behind ours to capture the photo. So, I took one too! His is a few feet shorter than ours (almost everyone’s is), we were both enthusiastic about the quality of the vans and we both wished we had more control over the electricals. An emerging theme!

On we travelled to just outside Broken Hill for which we had high hopes…and lots to do and see. Staying at Outback Resort👍, operated by the same people as Warrawong, afforded our first experience of nomad stalking. We’d been warned that it was common to meet people along the way and then meet them again, and again… We’d met Glen and Pat and their small DIY camper trailer next to us at Warrawong. He’d sold a house in Sydney and moved to Adelaide, she’d been covid-trapped in Italy for 2 years (she’s Italian), they’d reunited in Brisbane and were now camping their way towards Adelaide to settle down to spending half the year in Oz, half in Italy! Next day, we went to White Cliffs and found them there. At the pub for dinner, we saw them there. When we moved to Broken Hill, they were there, etc etc. To be fair, I think at BH, they took a cabin as the mattress in the trailer wasn’t great and to be even more fair, it was probably us doing the stalking! We lost them then but who knows…and imagine what else there is to find out!

White Cliffs was fun being opal based and largely underground. We had a tour of the Underground Motel to get the idea – maybe 30 rooms, carved out of the sandstone and 22 degrees all year round.

Even more fun was the upcoming Arts+Crafts Festival being set up in (you got it) the School of Arts. A bunch of enthusiastic locals, including some “wintries” (only here in winter), were hanging framed photos of almost all the towns’ 100 residents against a back drop of unimaginable handmade items – my personal favourites were the life-sized, crocheted pink and grey galahs, perfect for rear view mirror hanging, but no purchase was allowed. The town ladies get together every Friday morning for a “chinwag and craft”. One of their number pointed out that these little places with nothing happening often had the strongest community spirit – delightful. Opals being of no interest to us, we left the town richer for the experience and no poorer in the pocket. Glen bought Pat some earrings!

Other than some roadkill (mostly roos), we’ve seen almost no proper wildlife so far. Hundreds of feral goats, a few sheep and cattle and that’s about it. So, we were very excited to see an emu mob (well, 6). We were also excited about the racist overtones of the signs on the road to White Cliffs. BEWARE OF BLACK CATTLE they proclaimed. An explanation made everything clear – the black Angus cattle around here are very fond of lying on the warm, black bitumen at night. If they have their bums pointing at you there’s no flash from their eyes and the first time you see them is when you hit them – not good for cow or car.

Anyway, the dirt roads remained closed, so we headed in to Broken Hill proper to re-locate the van, start discovering the local highlights and to get a Sydney-made ding in the Landcruiser repaired. What could possibly go wrong?