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We now have packing up down to a fine art, we were up at 8.30am and then on the road by 9.30am with our coffee on board. We had a two and a half hour drive from Glen Innes to Yamba on the coast and for most of the journey we were driving through National Forrest. It was a very pretty drive through the Gibraltar State Forest with a few spots where we had to pull over to admire the fantastic views. At one stop we found another caravan taking advantage of the views so we stopped for half an hour for a chat with them, it turns out we were both at the Glen Innes showgrounds last night, they were driving home to Coffs Harbour. We continued on to Yamba through Grafton an historic town that we may need to call back to and take a wander through. We saw the signs for the caravan park we were booked into before coming to the town of Yamba so we turned off and followed the signs. The park is about 6kms out of town which is fine by us, it is a nice looking park with good facilities as you would expect with a Big 4 park. We signed in at the office and then drove to our site and set up. I had prepared lunch the previous day as I usually do for the day we are traveling so once we were set up we had lunch and then drove into take a look at the town of Yamba. Before we came to the town we saw a sign advertising fishing charters and Robb has been keen to take a charter so we called in here and booked him in for Friday then back in the car to drive into town. Yamba is much bigger than I expected with lots of shops, cafes and accommodation. We called into the Information Centre and picked up brochures to have a look at later on to decided what we were going to do while we were here. From the centre we drove to the beach to have a look, there is a steep walk down so we didn't take this but walked around to see as much as we could. It looks like there is a man made swimming pool there and a breaker wall out to the head waters. There were a few people out swimming and some surfing but the water was fairly rough and nobody seemed to be having much luck. We returned to the van from here where I tried to organise something to do tomorow.
Today we planned to drive to McLean a Scottish town not too far from Yamba but thought before calling in here we would drive to Grafton and have a look around. Grafton was the first town established on the north coast and has quite a few historic buildings and some of the old tiny houses are quite fascinating. We drove up and down the main street and then parked and walked to the police station which is located on the site of the original station, we walked out the back and part of the original building is still there, probably heritage listed. The court house is next door as was common back then and this is also a very attractive building. Over the road we spotted a huge church so we walked over there to have a look around. Grafton is a very attractive town with a good blend of the old and the new in a tropical setting.
From Grafton we headed back to Yamba stopping at Ulmarra on the way to have a look around. Ulmarra is a small port town with most of the buildings on the main road the original houses and there is a balconied hotel on the corner of the street. We called in for fuel here and the fuel stop was also a take away store that had the best looking pies on offer, apparently it is a popular stop for the local tradies. From here we drove to McLean a very Scottish town 20 minutes away from Yamba. The lampposts are wrapped in family tartans with the name on each one, we looked for Robb's family tartans but didn't find them. There are still a lot of the original buildings here too with quite a few of them operating as trendy cafes with the tables spilling out on to the street. We drove up to the lookout which had some great views over the area and from here we drove down to the Scottish Cairn on our way out of town. Driving back to Yamba we noticed a sign for the prawn farm so we thought we would take a look as the prices seemed quite good. Unfortunately they only had 3kg packs of the giant prawns that we were interest in and we were not able to store that many.
An easy day today so we decided to visit a couple of closer towns to Yamba. The first was Iluka, 40 odd minutes away, and an easy drive. Apart from the World Heritage Rainforest there wasn't much to look at so we drove down to the waterfront and had a walk along there. We called into the Fish Co-op but the prawns here were dearer than the ones in Yamba so we thought we would wait and get them later. From Iluka we drove to Angourie which is only another further 5kms on from Yamba. The headland seems to be the attraction here and there were quite a few people either surfing or watching the surfers from the lookout. The scenery was beautiful so we watched the surfers ourselves for a while before moving back to Yamba. We parked the car in Yamba and then walked up and down the street, we wanted somewhere to sit and have a beer but there wasn't anywhere we could find. We drove from the main street to the Marina and tried the Yacht Club but they didn't sell beer even though they were fully licensed. The lady at the Yacht Club suggested we try the Pacific Hotel and gave us directions on how to get there. Her directions were good and we found the hotel easily, we parked and walked inside where I went to find a table while Robb ordered our drinks. The views from the hotel were fantastic so I took a few photos here while we were watching a couple of surfers waiting to catch some waves. From here we drove back to the van stopping on the way at the Tru Blu Prawn farm where we purchased 1kg of prawns. Back at the van we had lunch and I did a couple of jobs before joining Robb outside. The weather turned a bit while we were outside with the temperature dropping very quickly and then the rain started. Robb was hoping to go out fishing tomorrow on a charter and he was waiting for a phone call at 5.00pm, unfortunately when the call came through it wasn't good news but he was expecting that with the wind like it was, never mind, next time.
Today is our last day in Yamba, we were half hoping that there might have been cancellations because of the lockdown in Brisbane and we knew the people coming into our site were Queenslanders, but that little hope was shattered yesterday afternoon. We are happy for the people who are able to go through with their bookings, as Victorians we understand how depressing the lockdowns can be but we would have liked another couple of days here. Never mind we are ready to move on and have planned our next stop at Lismore Showgrounds. Not sure how many nights we will do here but because we have moved so quickly so far and it will be school holidays in NSW we may book in for a week to see out the worst of the holiday period.
I took care of a few jobs in the morning and then we drove around Yamba looking for somewhere to sit and have a drink. We came across a tavern in a new estate which looked quite pleasant so we parked and walked in here to find a table. We ordered a couple of beers and a bowl of chips and sat in the alfresco area looking out towards the water. It was very pleasant here but we only had one drink and then drove back to our camp site. We didn't have lunch because we were still quite sated from the chips but we sat outside because it was a beautiful day. We decided to pack up the van ready for moving on tomorrow, Robb moved the van back a bit to make sure he was off the road. To drive out of here was going to be quite difficult, the road ahead is one way but there wasn't much room to maneuver around our site and the other campsites around us so I walked to the office and asked if we could drive out the other way and I would walk to the end of the short drive to make sure no one was coming in, they agreed that this was ok so we will do this when we leave. We are driving the short distance to Lismore tomorrow and we will plan the rest of our trip from there.
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