Up stupidly early and the kids are still asleep, I go to make a coffee and the next thing I see is both of them. Not only are they awake at 5:30, they’re completely dressed! Last of the stuff from the house packed and we’re ready to leave around 6am. I get a photo as I normally do of the kids hanging out of the car, but this one’s a bit different as it’s pitch black.
We take the easy route and go via the new tunnels again. The M1 is haze of fog as the sun starts to rise.
Up the Hunter expressway. Up until now the fuel economy has been pretty good. We finally pull in at Aberdeen to fill up and Justine takes over the driving. As we pass each town, we notice just about every motel has a “NO” next to its vacancy sign. I can’t say any look full, but something must be happening.
We drive though Willow Tree, last time we were here we turned off to Narrabri, but today we’re staying on the New England. Willowtree is packed, there are people everywhere. I hope that this tourist influx is good for the town.
Through Tamworth and the showground appears packed, some national Paint Horse competition. We take the CBD bypass, only a week ago this road was flooded, and you can see signs of the flood debris on the sides of the road.
We eventually pull into Uralla for lunch, we must have been through this town dozens of times, but this is our first time to stop. Like Willow Tree, it’s pretty busy and as we take a wander around town to stretch our legs. It certainly seems the pie shop is pretty popular, as the queue is out the door. It seems a bit too intense for us, but the local take away ends up being great food and better than expected.
Being the Easter weekend, of course the cops are everywhere.
I take over the driving, next town should be Glen Innes. About this time I realise that Glen Innes is 90km, but it seems we only have 80km worth of fuel left, crap. The Fuel Economy is starting to get rather Shite. A quick look and we should be able to get fuel at Guyra. We fill up, as we pull out and I check the range….. 300km, that’s all the car reckons we’re going to get out of this tank. Granted the tank is only small at 65lts, but hell. While we might have started of with good economy, it has, shall we say tanked!
Finally through Glen Innes, then through Deepwater and we’re on the home run. We find the turnoff and drive into the campsite. The sign says camp anywhere and they’ll come and collect the fees. The place, as expected is pretty packed. We eventually find a place between two other campers, I’m not sure they’re keen for us to be in between, but it’s large enough and if we don’t someone else will.
We’ve been on the road for 9hrs, about 680km. Hard, but surprisingly we’re fine and not anywhere near as knackered as I thought we might be. While longer than the Tom Price to Exmouth day, at least today we’d planned for it.
Out with the firepit and a campfire that I’ve been hanging out for to have for ages. The kids end up finding some other kids and play amongst the rocks and after dinner and some marshmallows there is the clearest sky I can remember in ages.
Easter Sunday Tomorrow, so time to hide some eggs!