The Barrier Highway heads across the Western Plains to Broken Hill and the deserts of South Australia. Leaving the Warrumbunbles shrinking in the rear view mirror the landscape opened out with big skies and the road tapering to a point on the horizon.
Wild flowers along the road side.
The Dry grassland to the far west of New South Wales.
One of few plants in flower, the flowers tough and waxy to the touch, presumably to guard against desiccation.
The smart and tidy Post Office building in the tiny town of Wilcannia half way along the Barrier Highway. This is the only smart building in the otherwise dilapidated and dying ex-mining town now left by the way side.
A few of the empty dilapidated buildings along the high street.
Some of the spectacular granite bluffs known as ‘The Warrumbungles’ formed by volcanoes 13 to 17 million years ago, of which 90% have eroded away leaving only the toughest remnants standing sentinel over the predominantly flat landscape.
After to many months working in the orchards I’ve finally saved what I need to continue my travels. I finished working in September and went on a whistle stop road trip around a small portion of Australia, and still clocked over 10,000km. I’m now in Ushuaia at the southern tip of Argentina wait for for my Antarctica cruise to depart.
From Stanthorpe in South East Queensland I headed south west through out back rural New South Wales to the deserts of South Australia. I then turned north on the Stuart Highway to Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. I hadn’t the funds or time to make it all the way up to Darwin, so turned east back into Queensland to the tropical coast and the Great Barrier Reef. Finally heading south down the east coast to catch a flight out of Sydney to South America.
In the centre of the north eastern quarter of New South Wales is the Warrumbungle National Park. Here a group of precipitous rocky bluffs, remnants of past volcanic activity, rise dramatically out of the flat savannah grassland that predominated the surrounding landscape. The park is reputed to be incredibly diverse in flora and fauna owing to its varying elevations and its location between the dry grassland inland to the west and the wetter forest stretching off to the east coast.
Looking down on one of the most distinguished features of the park ‘The Bread Knife’.
Views across the peeks of the park and looking out across the western plains, flat to the horizon and where I was headed.
Some of the plants growing on the bright, exposed, rocky parts of the park.
Unknown.
Unknown.Unknown.
Unknown.
And flowering in the dappled light of the cooler forested valleys floor.
Clematis sp.Acacia sp.
Black snake soaking up the rays in a dry creek bed.
Botanical Musings 