2026-05-19
We were up at around 6:30 this morning (too early, but it was light), and went through the usual routine (breakfast / coffee), after which it was down to town for a few supplies before returning to the van to pack down. Thankfully the rains seemed to have passed and there was even some sunshine as well. I broomed off the awning because, being parked under a deciduous tree for several days in the rain, it was both wet, and covered in leaves. Then on to the other packdown activities, with power disconnection coming last (so as to keep the fridge on power until the car was running and could take over powering it). A small detour on the way out to dispose of the contents of the WC cassette, and we were on our way.
It was a pretty uneventful trip to Coonabarabran, and not long enough to warrant stopping anywhere along the way. We arrived at the John Oxley Caravan Park at around 11:45ish, checked in, chose a site and set up. It was then that we discovered there was something not right with the mains power. The microwave powered on, but the fridge claimed there was no mains, and the power panel for the caravan power system showed "Mains" as flashing. I tried a all three points on the post, and even ran an extension over to the other post, but it was the same all round. So, I turned on the gas, and the fridge cut over to running on gas while we sorted out what was going on.
Over to the office we wandered to report our issues and while there we found out someone had reported an power related issue in the laundry, and in the office the lights were dim. Sounded like an area issue, but the caretakers called it in, and within 30 mins the local energy provider has a crew on site checking things out. By 13:30 or so, it was all resolved, much to our relief, although we still had 43% remaining on the 2.5kW battery "solar generator" in the car, so I'd have been alright for CPAP overnight if it had persisted. But, since the power was back, I moved the battery in to the caravan and plugged it in to charge it back to 100% in case there were further issues later.
While the we were waiting for the power issues to be resolved though, we popped in to town to the bakery to grab some lunch. A couple of little mini-pizzas, a raspberry slice thing, and a caramel macadamia tartlet. We returned to the van to eat these (saving half of the desserts for later) and then the power came back.
It was still relatively early, so we decided to drive out towards the Warrumbungles and see what could be seen, and scope out the Siding Spring Observatory to see when or if there were tours. As we approached the mountains, the sky grew darker. As we climbed upwards, the cloud base approached, and soon we were in very thick cloud. Thick enough towards the Observatory, that visibility was down to about 100m or less. We did see one dark coloured 4wd going down the mountain with no lights on - complete madness from a visibility point of view, but he seemed oblivious to that. At the top, the observatory grounds boom gate was up, but the visitor centre was closed with a "back at 1 o'clock" clockface type sign on the door. Dear readers, it was 14:25.
We'll return tomorrow, earlier in the day to see what's what. Back down this section of the mountain we went and turned towards the Warrumbungles National Park. There was a lookout not far in, White Gum Lookout iirc, so we went there for a short (500m each way) walk. It was about 11°C so coats were the order of the day and presumably the birdlife felt it was too cold to be out and about either, as I only saw one Currawong, and probably a scrubwren. We were no longer in the clouds, so there was a view of sorts from the lookout. Nicely moody.
As we got close to the car, it started to rain lightly, and then a bit heavier, so we retreated to the car and decided, given the time (now arount 15:15) to head back to camp. Back at camp, I went for a short walk around the grounds to look for birds, all of which were high in the trees and backlit. There were galahs, king parrots, eastern rosellas, noisy (or maybe yellow-throated) miners, currawongs and magpies. However, what was worth photographing was the last rays of sunset hitting some autumn trees.
For dinner, I did steamed Bao buns filled with a beef and vegetable mix, seasoned with chinese five spice, and korean gochugaru, a bit of soy sauce, some of the tomato sauce left over from last night's dinner, and some lime and coriander. It was delicious, and will likely be tomorrow night's dinner too.