10 October 2012 - Yarrawonga Westside Caravan Park, Sun Country, Victoria

I made the most of the clear morning to do a load of washing but did wonder as the day proceeded whether it would dry. My fears were unfounded; despite the cloud cover by mid-afternoon, there has been no sign of rain, yet.

With lunch packed in the eski, we headed into town, and explored the main street, walking up and down, picking up a newspaper and spending quite some time in an absolute treasure trove of a cheapy hardware shop. We escaped after some time without buying anything because there was nothing there we actually needed, and we are very good at deciphering the difference between ‘need’ and ‘want’.

The woman in the Information Centre had recommended several walks about the area and we were keen to find out for ourselves. It is here that the Murray River has been transformed into a gigantic lake covering some 4,500 hectares as part of the irrigation system and the construction of the weir in 1939. The lake is a big draw card for water birds, as well as tourists who enjoy the year round aquatic activities, skiing being one of the biggest. Much of the lake is decorated with the remains of drowned red gums which provide a breeding ground for fish and safe nesting holes for birds. The trees are slowly falling away however it will be some time before the lake looks as one would expect, an unblemished expanse of water inviting full use.

We drove to the yacht club and embarked upon a forty minute walk to the wetland surrounding Chinaman’s Island. There we encountered a huge variety of birds; squawking cockatoos, bossy magpies, darting and dancing superb blue wrens, cheeky willy wagtails and several defensive nesting birds who were not too timid to chase off the larger magpies.

Still feeling fighting fit, we returned to the Information Centre, parked and set off on a circuit to take in the bridge across to New South Wales and the weir. The bridge across the lake outlet was built in 1924 and demonstrates well the importance of listening and co-operation. The Victorian and New South Wales governments began construction independently and at different levels. A redesign part way though the project was required to get both ends of the bridge to meet. The result was the infamous “twisty dippy” bridge. We walked across this two lane bridge which is quite narrow and probably not for two buses at the same time. The road across the top of the weir however is single lane and controlled by traffic lights.

As we arrived on foot in New South Wales, we could not miss the very large ClubMulwala, the rather glamorous name for the RSL Club. The only giveaway regarding the true nature of the club is the large assembly area near the war memorial, the old tanks, guns and aeroplane on a stick. The big draw card here apart from the restaurants advertised are the pokies and other gaming facilities. It seems that Victoria is more restrictive regarding gambling and related matters, so those with a yen to throw their money away, hop across the border to New South Wales to divest themselves of their hard earned money, from which no doubt the New South Wales government takes a further cut.

As we walked over the weir we realised that Yarrawonga was the end of the navigable section of the river as there is no lock here and no obvious way to spirit one’s watercraft from river to lake. This was rather disappointing because Chris and I have been hatching a dream; to travel from one end of the river to the other in a small houseboat or similar craft, and had been considering such a trip to start at least as far upstream as Albury-Wodonga.

I was however pleased to find that that hydroelectricity is generated here by the water gushing through this aperture. The Yarrawonga Hydro Power Station is one of the first privately owned power stations to be constructed under the former State Electricity Commission of Victoria’s renewable energy initiative program. Construction was started in 1992 and completed two years later. Today power is contributed to the Victorian Grid System.

We lunched beside the lake surrounded by fast flying swifts, darting about to and fro like fighter pilots, amazing us with their agility. We decided that Yarrawonga was indeed a delightful place, especially when it was not filled with summer tourists or with sports people drawn by a specific event.

Kyffins Reserve

Our third walk was along the north western shore of the lake beyond the built up area of the small strung out settlement of Mulwala. We set off along the lakeshore supposedly walking to the Kyffins Reserve. Whether we arrived at this reserve or not is irrelevant; we enjoyed our walk very much, delighting in the flora and fauna and the strangeness of the lake, here looking very like the bike helmets some wear to deter magpies, outstretched wire spikes. We walked as far as an abandoned houseboat on the lake edge; we stamped through the long grass hoping to scare off any snakes and spent some moments imagining restoring such a craft for our dream adventure. Here there were no fast flying swifts but tenacious flies so we walked waving eucalypt branches in front of our faces like windscreen wipers. These worked well however intermittent photography gave opportunity for the patience of these horrible pests.

It was after 1.30 pm when we arrived back in Mulwala, in time for the restricted opening hours of the Yarrawonga-Mulwala Pioneer Museum. Robbie, the proprietor of the camp here, had encouraged us to visit the museum and so we did. It is run by elderly volunteers, all obviously rank amateurs, but still manages to appeal to the likes of us and half a dozen other travellers. Chris was particularly taken with the museum and the wealth of miscellaneous memorabilia and so we ended up spending well over an hour there.

We called into the Information Centre yet again to ask some questions about navigating the Murray River and found ourselves engaged in lengthy conversation with Karen, a lovely vivacious young woman, who told us about several eccentrics who had undertaken the journey and her involvement with their planning. One such adventurer was an American who shipped his stand-up paddle board to the Centre here at Yarrawonga, arrived one day straight off the plane, assembled it in the middle of the tourism office and set off the same day randomly joining a chap in an open boat, equipped with little more than a mattress and a dog, doing the same. She offered us her assistance with any planning however we assured her we were still in the very preliminary planning stages and any such plan actually coming to fruition was most likely a year or more away.

The washing was quite dry when I rescued it from the line on our return and no other traveller had joined us in the camp; apart from the permanents, we are the only guests. Tomorrow we will travel the last stage of our river journey.