Day 26 (120)

100Km Forbes to Tomingley NSW

Sunny & cloudy ⛅️ high of 30

🏡Home for night
Cross Roads Hotel ⭐️
Free camp at rear
Power available for $15
Access to pub toilets
Flatish sites, limited shade
Optus reception

🚶🏼‍♀️4km hike

👍🏻 Elvis Museum was a nice surprise
👎🏻

This morning we said goodbye to Ken, Bernadette and Max 🐕 as we headed in opposite directions 👋🏻

For us, today was all about the journey

Our first stop was the Henry Parkes Centre in Parkes for the King’s Castle, a tribute to Elvis Presley - $12 entry.
We couldn’t visit Parkes and not acknowledge Elvis 🤷🏼‍♀️
The Elvis Museum contains a collection of memorabilia owned by Greg Page (Yellow Wiggle).
Outside there are even replicas of the Graceland Gates
Attached and included in the entry was the Antique Motor Museum 🚘

And our good deed for the day was handing in a set of keys that were dangling from a padlock on the gate around the museum 🔐

Next the Parkes Observatory to see The Dish, one of the largest single-dish telescopes in the southern hemisphere dedicated to astronomy.
It started operating in 1961 and in July 1969 it was a prime receiving station for the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon
Our brains got a workout with the information presented in the 3D movie and the interactive exhibits

Peak Hill was our next stop for the Gold Mine Experience - free entry.
Gold was discovered at Peak Hill in 1889 and the historic Peak Hill mine operated between 1893 and 1917 producing about 60,000 oz from 500,000 tonnes of rock. The site was re-excavated between 1996 and 2002 retrieving 145,000 ounces gold from 4.9 million tonnes of rock.
There are 2 trails that explore the site and the original diggings with the vertical mines and the 5 modern open cut mines. We did both trails at a total of 4km with 109m elevation.

Our final stop was the Cross Roads Hotel, Tomingley
Camping is behind the pub but we almost drove into the motel car park in error - which would have been funny (not) trying to get out 😳
Anyway disaster averted we set up and headed inside.
We have a ‘rule’ - no drinking on a week day (FYI Friday is part of the weekend) UNLESS we happen to be visiting a pub, distillery, winery, brewery……..
We know today is Monday but we’re staying at a pub and HAD to have a drink as a thank you for letting us camp up for the night 🤷🏼‍♀️Read more