Before I talk about Mudgee I just wanted to talk
about how big Australia, how vast and yet there we were a quick stop in
Wellington to have lunch and let the boys run around in a park and we ran into
friends from Canberra. It turned out
they were heading back from Queensland to Canberra and had stopped to try lunch
at the Wellington Pub. They of course
parked a few cars away and there they were as we walked along the footpath –
the chances of that must be astronomical but it was lovely to see them here.
Last year we did a loop from Canberra, through Cowra
to Dubbo, then on to Sydney through the Blue Mountains and we stopped in Mudgee
to get petrol and let the boys have a play in a park. We thought this time we would at least have a
proper look at Mudgee. It turns out
Mudgee is pretty much the same size as Cowra but they have very different
feels. Firstly and unsurprisingly, Mudgee
is very much about wine and then gourmet food.
We stayed in a lovely caravan park by the creek that runs through
Mudgee. The park was very centrally
located and even though many of the sites were occupied as it was school
holidays, it was quite quiet. At the
back of the park was a walk/cycle way that you could take to get into the main
part of town or just walk along the creek.
Our boys had a great time cycling along here.
Our first day we did a drive around the place,
looking at the wineries and planning to have lunch at the Honey Haven but
whilst it said there was a café this was only for coffee. So we went into town
and had lunch at the bakery. We then
spent the afternoon walking for us and riding for the boys along the pathway by
the creek. It was a very pleasant day.
The next day we decided to try the Drip Gorge Walk –
which rated very high on trip advisor which is fast becoming a firm friend of
mine. So after a fairly leisurely
morning we packed up our picnic lunch and off we went. The walk is about 30 minutes north of Mudgee
if you take the right road – or you could take the scenic drive as we did
through Gulgong. Gulgong is another
spectacular old town with sensational architecture. Anyway we arrived at the correct destination
which is not far from the fairly massive Ulan coal mine. The walk is not far off the road, so after
eating our lunch we were off. The sign
post was interesting with some graffiti saying this place was better than
Kakadu , followed by someone else saying that the Chinese now owned it. David and I have been to Kadadu and this walk
does not have the epic vastness that Kakadu or Ubirr have. It was however, one of the best walks we have
ever done in NSW. I will talk about the
Chinese later.
The walk was about 3km but it is up and down a bit
so with our kids at least took longer than the 45 – 60 mins suggested by the
signpost. It was a beautiful walk
through forest, carved sandstone rock faces, honeycombed rocks all alongside a
lovely river.
The drip is an amazing towering sandstone cliff from
which water drips out allowing ferns and plants to literally grow out of the
rock. At the drip gorge the river meets
the rock wall and the result is this lovely corner of rock face, ferns, river
and rocks. From our kids perspective
they lucked out as another boy turned up minutes after us with his grandparents. Almost the same age the kids had a great time
playing in the water for quite some time.
Then it was time to head back – just a warning if you undertake this
brilliant walk, the track can be rough in some places and it does involve a
little bit of clambering up and down and along the edge of the water. But it is truly worth it.
And as to the Chinese, well it turned out to be
true. In 2010 the NSW government
converted more than 700 hectares of Crown land to freehold title for a Chinese coal
company for $2084. This included this
amazing gorge. After becoming an issue
in the last election, the gorge will now be added to the nearby Goulburn River
National Park.
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