Day 21 (115)

57 Km Wyalong to Caragabal NSW

Overcast morning with clouds clearing⛅️, humid, high 29

🏡Home for night
Caragabal Sportsground ⭐️
Donation appreciated- QR code at gate
Toilets- not great (nor those in town)
Flat sites, not much shade
Limited Optus Reception

🚶🏼‍♀️6km Hike

👍🏻 Warm welcome at the Caragabal Pub
👎🏻 Closed trail sign ❌

Before leaving we went to look around the Cooinda Reserve.
It provides an insight into the areas historic past, inc its gold mining heritage, with relics including the True Blue Poppet Head, Neeld’s hut and the huge Liebherr Excavator Bucket.

We wanted to explore the trails in the Weddin Mountains National Park so decided to stop off at Caragabal, park the van at the sportsground and head in.

We started our hike from Seaton’s Farm, the historic site of the 1930’s farm built with recycled local materials. Farm buildings, machinery and equipment scattered around demonstrate the resourcefulness of the family that lived there.

From here we headed into Berthas Gully and falls (grade 4 trail) where we hit an ‘Area Closed’ sign ❌
We then took the trail to Ben Hall’s Cave, reputed to be the hideout of one of the most revered bushrangers in Australia’s history. In 1862, eight bushrangers incl Ben Hall carried out what was then the greatest robbery in Australian history when they held up the gold coach. They escaped with £3,700 cash & 2,719oz gold, the equivalent of over $1m dollars. The proceeds were never recovered and legend has it that the booty is still stowed somewhere in the Weddin Mountains- unfortunately we didn’t find it 🤪

We returned via Ben Hall’s campground to complete the loop- a total of 6 km and 130m elevation.

Back at camp we met Brad, a local, who recommended the pub for ‘a good feed’
So we said we would head in for dinner 🍽️
And so glad we did ‘cause we had a great night 😊
We received such a wonderfully warm welcome and sat at the bar chatting to publican Tanya and local Ruth, who we discovered was Brad’s partner
Dinner was yummy🍔, drinks were cold🍻, aircon was blowing 🌬️and the conversation was great 💬
Would highly recommend and will def return if we are in the area - and Tanya we will let you know if we ever get our church 😜

Walking home we met a very chatty Romani and witnessed a fabulous sunset 🌅Read more