3 - Narooma NSW - travelling south March 2018
We spent 6 nights at the beautiful location of Lake Brou
campground and needed to move on, looking for open skies to access solar power to
boost our dwindling batteries power. About 35 kilometres along the road we
propped at the township of Bermagui a vibrant fishing community, camping the
night at a private property about 5 kilometres from town in a bush setting.
Bermagui information centre was a hub of information for local and nearby
locations, one of the better information centres we had experienced. This was
another beautiful viewing region with a mixture of sandy beaches, rugged rocky
coastline, a busy recreational fishing port with a constant stream of boats at
the boat ramp. Our visit coincided with an outdoor sculpture exhibition.
Bermagui was another location one could consider as a
retirement spot which was not on our agenda at that point in time, our
preference to continue traveling in our caravan, seeking out Australian natural
scenery and for this trip to experience Australia’s Coastal Wilderness along
the lower N.S.W. coastal region. Our next stop was at Gillard’s Campground in
the Mimosa Rocks National Park about 30 kilometres down the road.
The final 10 kilometres of road to Gillard’s Campground was
along a dirt road winding through beautiful thick woodlands. We selected a
spot, setting camp and found the need to speak quite loud with one another due
to the loud background noise of crashing surf.
Gillard’s Campground was another beautiful special location.
During our first night Mary was woken by some noise outside. She opened the
caravan door to see some kangaroos munching on the grass under our awning with
their heads under the table and chairs. We woke in the morning to discover it
had been raining overnight which would normally sound quite loud on the caravan
roof but at this location wasn’t heard due to the constant loud noise generated
by the crashing ocean waves. We walked along a wooded track we located at the
northern end of the campground and came across an inland lake with plenty of
swans and pelicans. Of interest a conversation with the people camped next to
us revealed one of them was an artist and had a couple of sculptures on display
at the Bermagui sculpture display and was slowing making their way to Bermagui
to retrieve their sculptures at the end of the show. Another different
interesting conversation.
Gillard’s campground was another one of those locations you
could keep on staying at, but we had a time frame to work to, which also required
due consideration for the approaching Easter holiday period, a most busy time
with crowded locations and a need to find a location to stay during this time
line.
We continued south stopping to view some locations, missing
so many other available spots. This was certainly a beautiful seaside strip of
country. Tathra a typical location with below picture taken at Tathra showing a
vibrant community.
(Five days after we were at Tathra the township was devastated
by an out of control bush fire destroying 69 homes and leaving another 39 homes
damaged. In addition to other structures damaged or destroyed were the loss of
30 caravans and cabins. How quickly can a beautiful setting change?)
The coastal regions along this spot of Australia are mostly
controlled by commercial operations consisting of a mixture of luxury
accommodation types and plenty of caravan parks with very limited freedom
camping locations. Our preference to be amongst the true Australian bush with
the best available locations in National Parks, unfortunately we skipped past
many beautiful locations due to controls imposed by commercialised enterprises.
We spent two days driving to our next location about 120
kilometres down the road at Mallacoota in Victoria. The only camping area
available was at one of the local caravan parks where we booked into the
Foreshore Caravan Park. It was one big caravan park with 710 sites. We thought
we had arrived during the non-peak season but found ourselves having a choice
of only 4 available powered sites. It was crowded.
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| We were about 3/4 the way down the campground and as you can see there was a long way still to go till the end |
We were very happy with our time at Mallacoota, in another
magnificent setting, surrounded by the Croajingolong National Park. The
township faces onto two large lakes which form the estuary of the Wallagaraugh
and Genoa rivers with about 320 kilometres of shore line. There were many
walking tracks and short drives available.
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| Hooded Plover with two young ones |
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| Wombat Poo |
On the drive out from Mallacoota we stopped for another walk
amongst the bush at the Double Creek Nature Walk. The background chorus
provided by the bell and whip birds were quite loud, tantalising our ears, the
flora and fauna had our eyes dancing all over the place with the sweet smells
of the bush like perfume for our noses. First, we spotted a Koala high up in
the trees, then a first for us, a pair of Lyre Birds and one of the biggest Red
Bellied Snakes we have ever seen at about 2 metres. We certainly departed
Mallacoota in high spirits.
Our next planned destination was to stay on the banks of the
Snowy River near where it enters the ocean. We were disappointed with the camp
locations situated only a few metres from the edge of the main road and decided
to continue to our next planned destination of Lakes Entrance, travelling a bit
over 100 kilometres for the day. We set camp near the rear of the Water Wheel
Tavern at Lake Tyer about 10 kilometres from Lakes Entrance, (no charge for the
first night and $15 each other night). Another interesting location with time
to see how this type of location affects us.
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