Wilcannia - 9 July 2014

We had a little rain overnight. It didn't last long and sounded like tiny stones were being thrown at the caravan park. The winds were quite strong overnight but today as the day went on the ferocity of them increased. According to the forecast they were supposed to increase to 65 kpm. I wouldn't be surprised if they were stronger than that. We even packed our back awning away and pulled the roof of our pop-top down. There is a van across from us, belonging to one of the builders working in town at the school, and it just about lost his awning. Bruce and another fellow went over to try and fix it, but it didn't last long. We saw other people working on it again after that. He has a great heater made from a 44 gallon drum.

We spoke to a couple this morning who had driven in from Cobar this morning in their van, into the wind. They could see their fuel gauge dropping very quickly.

We had some morning tea in town before filling up with fuel. The price at the BP Depot wasn't too bad - $1.67.9. There was an enclosure just behind the diesel pump with 3 snarling dogs. I think that is an indication of the security measures needed!

Wilcannia, settled in the 1860's, was a large inland river port in its heyday. Unfortunately, those days are long gone. But there are some beautiful sandstone buildings left from that era and we drove round and had a look at them. The Police Station and residence and the Courthouse are lovely. The building called The Athenaeum (School of Arts with library and reading rooms) was built in 1884. The youngest son of Charles Dickens, Edward Dickens, was on the committee. Wilcannia Cricket Club had 2 of Charles Dickens on the committee at one time. What is now the Wilcannia Golf Club was the first brewery in Australia in 1890 of Edmund Resch, a famous beer baron. The Hospital was also a lovely building.

As we left the supermarket, a truck went past with a huge boat on it. It was on the road to White Cliffs and Broken Hills. Not much water out that way!

As we were leaving town and heading back to the Caravan Park, we stopped off to have a look at the old bridge which is now Heritage Listed. It was built in 1896. When it was first built there were a lot of sheep with drovers on the road. In the early 1900's an old woman lived near the bridge and had a pet sheep that she would hire out at 10 pound a time to lead the drover's mobs across the bridge. 10 pounds in those days would have been worth a fortune.

We spent the afternoon inside the van as it was just so windy. Late this afternoon we went over to reception as a talk was being given by an indigenous artist, Eddy Harris. He talked about his paintings and how he started as an artist. He used to work in the mines at Broken Hill. The mine closed down and he thought he would give painting a go. He started off painting sandshoes and selling them to his friends. Last year he won the Pro Hart Prize for Hanging Art at Dunedoo I think it was. About 400 artists enter. He was very interesting to list to. He had a couple of didgeridoos he had painted and played one of them. He then turned it around and played it from the other end. It sounded completely different. He showed us some beautiful painted emu eggs.

We had a bit more rain tonight as we were preparing dinner. Again, not much to speak of. The wind was still blowing. We heard on the news about the 140 kph winds that were hitting Victoria. Hope they stay there.