1 March, 2011 - Mother of Ducks Lagoon, Guyra, NSW

Another day on the road and now officially the beginning of autumn. Maybe that accounts for the fact that an electrical storm is circling around us, and that we have just survived a hail storm. Fortunately the latter was not a typical Australian hail storm, when stones as big as cricket balls are thrown from the heavens.

Our camp tonight is beside wetlands high on the Great Divide. We have yet to investigate the area because we arrived later than normal to set up camp, and the skies soon blackened, but will do in the morning before we move on.

We left our camp at Tenterfield this morning and came further south on the New England Highway, traversing the plans, valleys and hills on top of this great range of mountains. Beyond Tenterfield the clutter of granite boulders lessened and great expanses of pastoral land opened up. Here it was possible to imagine hay making or cultivation for re-sowing because the gum trees were not so randomly scattered across the land. Here we saw more cattle and sheep so they no longer appeared an abnormality.

We arrived at Glen Innes in the late morning, a town of about 3,000 people that we had thought to be no more than a  settlement to pass through on our way, but like so many of these places we are discovering, it was so much more. The town was settled way back in 1838 and gazetted as a town in 1852. There is a strong Celtic theme here as so many of the original settlers came from Scotland. In 1988, the bi-centenary year of the country, the Celtic Council of Australia, chose Glen Innes as the location for a national monument to honour all Celtic peoples who helped pioneer Australia.

The result is a monument comprising 40 granite monoliths, the Standing Stones; a circle of 24 stones representing 24 hours of the day, three central stones, four cardinal stones marking true north, east, south and west, and seven stones marking summer and winter solstices, the longest and shortest days of the year. They are probably the first of their kind built anywhere in the world for 3500 years, and maybe unique in the southern hemisphere, however it would seem that none of these people know about those in Carterton in New Zealand’s Wairarapa. Each of the stones stand 3.7 metres from ground level, which means each had to be 5.5 metres in total length, and each stone weighs an average of 17 tonnes. The result is quite impressive.

This place is located in the Centennial Parklands high on the hilltop overlooking the town, and is home to the annual Australian Celtic festival. This year, in fact later in this month, the gathering is to celebrate the Irish.

A be-kilted Aussie by the name George was our well meaning guide however it was not too long before he dropped his faux-Scots accent and started to complain about the damage the government has done to Glen Innes: no more rail, the closing of the tin mine, politicians only caring for those living in the cities, the United Nations plan to reduce the world’s population to 50 million, et cetera, et cetera. I begged the call of nature and we escaped his clutches leaving him to accost some other innocent tourists.

After lunch we drove down in to the town, walked the streets as is our normal pattern, purchased yet another reference book to swell our library (this time on the weird and wonderful mammals of Australia) and then visited the local museum, The Land of the Beardies History House.

This is situated in the old hospital which is a wonderful collection of buildings with its own history. Then there is the paraphernalia of the community that grew up over  160 years of settlement. This is truly a marvellous museum and mainly so because there is so much space to spread the exhibits out with their stories in a rational and viewer friendly manner. So often these collections of the past are just piled one on top of the other and can, in some unfortunate cases, appear to be merely a great pile of junk. Not so here. This museum is apparently renowned as one of Australia’s better regional folk museums.

Once free of yet another clutch of volunteer guides, we drove south seeking a rest area just south of Glen Innes. We found the place, but were not too impressed with its proximity to the main highway, so travelled further south here to Guyra and found this wonderful little unofficial camp which is also noted in our bible. About another ten camping parties have made the same choice, so it should be a good safe place to overnight.