Saturday 2nd July

 A longer drive today from Darling Point to Bourke of 570Km, stopping at Cobar for lunch. We originally thought we’d head for Dubbo and visit the famous Open plains Zoo as we had not visited that area before. Since arriving in NSW, all we’ve heard about is the expected torrential downpour on the east coast of NSW and southern Queensland, over the next few days. Sydney is expected to receive about 200ml of rain over two days. Flood warnings have been issued etc.  We checked out the areas that could likely be affected and decided we needed to keep heading inland to avoid the worst of it, hence we are now at Bourke. We experienced light showers and drizzle for most of the day while driving but arriving at Kidman’s Camp caravan park in Bourke, the weather had improved and there was no rain although it was still cold. The temperature had struggled to reach 14 degrees today. We decided to have 2 nights in Bourke as we really enjoyed our time here on our last trip. The caravan park is located adjacent to the Darling River. We remembered that a small, tourist paddle-steamer is tied up to the bank in the river near the caravan park. Last time we were here (during a drought) we did a tour on the Darling River on this boat. We remembered that we drove out to the paddle-steamer and parked the car before boarding the boat. This time there is so much water all over the flood plain that the carpark and road are both underwater and the only way for tourists to reach the boat is via a flat-bottom dingy. There is a lot of water lying around but I think/hope we won’t have any issues.

You don't see those too often now (Darlington Point)

Took to goes to fill the tank in Bourke