The green, green lawns of Moree

Bird of the Day:  Magpie Goose – although found in Victoria this is way South of where we have ever seen them.  For big flocks Black Kite gets a tick for continual groups of 5 -10 along the road from Lightning Ridge to Moree.

Plant of the Day: Cotton.  Again: to misquote the start of an old toothpaste ad - "You'll wonder where your water went ... ". It doesn't have to be a good plant!

Scene of the Day:  The art deco buildings of Moree.

Art of the day:  CWA Bullarah hall, out in the middle of nowhere.

Typically Australian thing of the day: Signs for school bus stops.

Maximum Temperature  18 Minimum temperature 5

Distance traveled  with camper  450  without camper 0

I had made a couple of enquiries about the best way to get to Moree and the unanimous advice was to stick to the bitumen as the dirt road was badly corrugated.  The main problem appeared to be lack of rain, meaning that the Shire couldn't get a grader in.  This meant back into the centre of the town and we found a Farmers Market was going on.  While Frances went in there I took Tammy for a walk round the Gem Gardens

This was a decorated fountain at the entrance to the gardens.  They were very well set up with many named plants.

I then went into the Market after agreeing that some blood oranges would be a good idea.    At some point in this process Tammy met a few other dogs and I had interesting conversations with the owners while the usual sniffing went on.  I've come to the conclusion that the great sociability between dogs reflected the fact that the canine meetings tended to occur on neutral territory.

Back on the road and back towards Walgett, then a swift left hand down a bit and on to Collarenebri where we found a Memorial ...

.. and a welcoming Murray Cod ..

... or 6!

In the middle of nowhere we came across the Bullarah CWA Hall.  Very amusingly and carefully decorated, but I can't remember seeing a habitation within a bull's roar of the place!  It is apparently the centre of this community!

As we got to the edge of Moree we drove through a lot of very up-market houses with very green lawns.  The contrast to the cactus ridden dirt of Lightning Ridge was dramatic.  As in the past when we have visited towns on the rivers we questioned the use of water in this way.  (I'm not sure it lets Cubby Station off the hook, but a few brown yards around town would indicate that they're trying.)

A quick trip to the visitor Centre directed us to the RSL where a most ornate Memorial was located.  I had some difficulty framing that shot to omit an advert for FOX TV mounted prominently on the Club!

We also had a booklet for their Historic Tour of the town centre which we set off to do.  As we parked I heard honking (of a goose-like rather than V8hoon-like nature) coming from the Gwydir River.  Blow me down with a feather: it was replete with Magpie Geese.

The following image captures the throbbing liveliness (not) of Moree on a Sunday afternoon.  I was reminded of a Dr Who episode in which the Tardis lands on a totally deserted planet and the Doctor's companion - Tegan I think- commented that it reminded her of Brisbane on a Sunday afternoon.  Moree was similar: in the hour we were there we saw about 10 people!

They did have some nice old buildings however!

Given the past history of race relations in Moree it was pleasing to see the decoration outside the Police Station.

We decided that as it was still early afternoon we would not, as planned, stop in Moree but press on to Inverell and save ourselves some driving the next day.  En route we drove through the village of Gravesend.  As usual, we kept an eye open for a War Memorial, and found one prominently positioned beside the Highway.

(Over the trip as a whole we found some 14 'towns' which had not been entered into the Register as having a Memorial.  I suspect there will be other instances where a memorial was listed, but we found additional ones.  A special page in this series will cover a review of this project.)

Warialda was somewhat larger and the memorial there was Registered.

Also in Warialda I was amused by these adverts for a cleaning company!

Delungra was another addition to the list!

So we got to Inverell and set up camp.  I asked the owner/manager of the park if small dogs were allowed and he replied "I've got 3 myself.  Do you want one?".  Here is ours, established for the evening.

The bloke also said it was likely to get a bit cold so put the water jug in the camper.  He wasn't wrong: we have a water bowl for Tammie in the camper and it had ice on it the next morning - the only time I remember that happening.

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