After a good night’s sleep , we wake to our 32nd wedding anniversary - we look at each other and wonder where did that time go ???? Would we change anything ? nope , not a chance !!!
And what do you do on your wedding anniversary , pack up and drive down the road of course !! Today we are headed to Tallangatta - only 78 klms away , about 30klms short of Wodonga . There was a few decent climbs to drive up , and with that a few decent downhills as well !! We left Corryong at 9:30am and had arrived at Tallangatta at 10:30 am . We stopped and checked out where we were going to stay , when the local police drove past , turned and parked in front of us - we looked at each other - Lyn said “ should I turn off the engine “ I agreed , then the policeman came up to the window . He proceeded to find out where we were from , where we were going , and how long we were staying here . He then went about telling us all the places we should visit , with detailed descriptions of them , some of his travel adventures , where he was brought up , some cycling tracks for us , when not to be on the dam in the kayak , which waterfall to visit & where , must visit Dartmouth Dam & Mitta Mitta , a few good campsites here & there , where he lives now and when he used to own the caravan park . All this while he stood in the hot sun in all his police gear and vest - it was 34 degrees - we were melting in the car !!! Talk about community policing .
We ended up going to the showground and setting up there before having lunch and checking out some of his suggestions .
Tallangatta has a lot of water frontage - when the Hume Dam is high enough , otherwise it has a lot of beach . This is just one of the user friendly areas .
From the water we headed for the heights of the lookout over town , as recommended by Simon ( local Police ) . He told us he used to ride his bike up the hill & then ride up a fire trail to the top of another hill - took him 45 mins - then 12 mins to get back down - we wouldn’t have made it up the first 100m of the hill - it is steep !!!! But the views from the top are worth it - you get views of the Hume Dam - its only a maximum of 50m deep when it’s full , so it’s a shallow dam . In previous trips here we have seen barely a trickle out in the middle where the old creek bed is , now it is about 1.5m below full . As you can see , there are a lot of dead trees all across the water indicating how deep it is .
Back into town for a bit of a poke round , and we found Lord’s Hut . It was relocated from Old Tallangatta before it was flooded , then moved to this location in the 1980’s . It’s an old slab hut & stone chimney - we think they did pretty well to be able to relocate it - they did in one piece too !!
Time to head back to the van & some air conditioning for a while . Salsa & a beer were called for .
This is our view across the show ground .
Time for some tea , so we headed down to the Tallangatta Hotel , ordering a rib eye steak and grilled barramundi , we did order some garlic bread , but the barman said it might be a bit much as the meals were large , we cancelled the garlic bread !! Good thing we did , the meals arrived and we were amazed . The fish smelt great and tasted the same , the steak , well it was about 25mm thick , still on the bone and was as big as my hand - must have weighed at least 400 grams , it was enormous , but was a really nice piece of meat !! I asked for mushroom sauce - it would have been one mushroom & gravy , all this with salad & chips !! and it was only $25 !! Lyns barramundi was the size of 2 pieces of fish from the fish & chip shop and only $18 with salad & chips , what good value - especially if you’re hungry !!
After tea we walked out into the bar to leave , a few of the locals asked what we’d done to be pulled over by the police - when we told them it was Simon , they all laughed - apparently he’s known for it , and doesn’t mind a chat , but we loved it and found out some great attractions and information . We walked down the street to try and walk off some of our lovely meal , then headed for home , day done .
13/1/17 Bridges , waterfalls and footy matches
Following some more of Simon’s recommendations , we headed off toward Corryong again. This time we were headed to Koetong and an historic rail bridge . About 8klms up the road is the Old Tallangatta Lookout , so we stopped for a look . In previous trips we’d seen some of the old foundations etc , now they are covered up with water . You can make out the foundation poles of an old bridge just poking out of the water in the 2nd photo . The lookout is above the old rail line , which is now a cycling / walking / horse riding rail trail that goes further up into the hills and all the way back to Wodonga .
Across the water is the old butter factory , as well as other houses & buildings that were above the water line of the dam .
Climbing up another good hill after leaving the valley , we found our turnoff and parked at the carpark . Walking down the track - only 300m , we found the rail cutting and wandered down then came back to the bridge that was in front of where we parked the ute . It was a timber bridge , in a poor state of repair , and we were a little underwhelmed , so headed back to the ute and drove off .
As we were driving down the road , I glanced over to the right and saw the bridge - not the one we just looked at , but the one we should have looked at , so we turned around and parked beside the road , walking in along a newly graded track to the western side of the bridge . This bridge is about 50m long and much more impressive !! Back in the ute and parked on the other side of the creek and walked in an access track to the eastern end . It is a curved bridge spanning a small creek , the termites have certainly had a few meals out of it !!
The forest here is beautiful , and we discovered some orchids as well - they were small .
Back toward Tallangatta , and turned off toward Granya , a very small village . The road wound it’s way back & forth uphill & over Mt Granya . A sign appeared to a lookout and fire watch tower - it was only 8klms , so away we went . It was an excellent gravel road and an easy drive to the top .
The lookout was over George’s Creek Road in the valley below , we were 870m above sea level . After the lookout we did a walk through the forest surrounding the fire watch tower , before having a chat with Jack - the fire watch warden , even assisted him by attaching his bucket to the rope , so he could pull it up to the tower - saved him a trip down to tie it on - which he was grateful for !!
Back to the main road , we wound our way back down the hill to the little village of Granya . One of Simon’s stories was brought home after our trip up the hill - apparently Tallangatta and Granya used to play football against each other . The trip was done using horse and cart ( before cars ) , they would take their horse & carts along the side of the creek and up to Mt Granya , picking the lowest spot in the mountain to go over , they would leave their horse’s & cart’s at the top of the hill and the Granya people would pick them up and take them down to play football . Once all the onfield rivalries had finished and the game was over the Tallangatta people would clean up and be delivered back to the top of the mountain again by their rivals from Granya . It would have been a big days travel to climb 600m or more upwards , and then they had to play football as well !!!
Turning off we head down toward Granya Falls picnic area , where we had lunch . Then we headed off up the track to the falls , first we found the Scout Hut , which was built in 1937 just above the creek fed from the falls further up the mountain .
The rock here is granite , and has a lot of mica in it - little pieces shining at you as you walk past .
Arriving at the falls was good , it was getting very humid - really steamy and threatening to rain - we even took the umbrella with us !! The falls aren’t spectacular at the moment , we were expecting them to be in the middle of the gully , but they were on the side , and had a small amount of water trickling down .
Heading back down it was still trying to rain , not enough to get wet in however . Back to the ute and we headed back into Granya , going through the village and arriving at the Murray River side of the Hume Dam . From there we headed beside the water toward Albury , turning off at the ferry / punt service that runs from Wymah Point to the NSW side .
Further down we turned off toward the south to Bethangra , a small town with hotel , general store & primary school - it’s main claim to fame would be the mining that went on here - gold of course , and when that turned too difficult to extract the gold from the rock , they mined copper instead . This is the view back toward Hume Dam Wall and Wodonga from Kurrajong Gap Lookout .
We drove back into Bethangra and drove around the edge of the water on the opposite side to Tallangatta , passing through Old Tallangatta before getting back to the van .
Here’s a map link for today & yesterday : - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1VF3cngWqofYpt7-4mgsDqvYEqaI&usp=sharing
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