The Waterfall Way

There’s no doubt that some Australians like to brag that Australia has the biggest and the best.  Sometimes there’s some truth in it, sometimes it’s more imagination than fact.  In northern New South Wales, the coast is separated from the inland (there’s not a lot of remote ‘bush’) by what are known as mountains – the Great Dividing Range.  ‘Mountains is stretching it a bit as there’s not many of them that reach more than about 750 metres.  However, what they lack in height, they make up in grandeur.  Covered in green, usually eucalypts and pines, the Great Dividing Range extends the entire east coast plus a bit in the south.  One relatively small part of this is known as New England and an even smaller part that extends along a highway is called the Waterfall Way.  

We’ve spent the last couple of days exploring and after the recent rains, found that the waterfalls really do live up to their names – Dangar Falls, a spectacular single drop, Crystal Shower Falls, which includes a cave behind the curtain of water, Ebor Falls with three drops one after another. There's other too, just as spectacular in their own way and all flowing freely after the recent rains.

Much of our journey was on unmade roads, mostly in pretty good condition but with a few washouts and fallen trees on the more remote tracks.  Vin Rouge was happy enough climbing the gradients in a low gear (we’re a bit on the heavy side fully laden) and trampling over the branches of fallen trees.  We saw only a little wildlife, an emu, a couple of pademelons (small relatives of the kangaroo), lorikeets, galahs, and some parrots.  Oh yes, we ruined a snake’s day by running over its tail.  We came across a giant tallowood tree, nearly 200 feet high according to the sign.  We even discovered a Lavatree.

The map identified a place that rejoiced under the name of Timmsvale, so of course we had to go and have a look.  It wasn’t easy to find, half way up an unmade road leading to nowhere.  We did find it, a scattering of homesteads mostly belonging to people with the Timms surname.  We didn’t discover whether the population was related, but did learn that the place owed its creation to one Lionel Timms, who not only established a hydro-electric powered mill for turning the huge tees into lumber, but also built a 360 seat cinema in the town of Ulong, which is or was the main population centre.  It’s declined a bit; there’s only 120 people there now and a good many of them seem to have the surname Timms.

Timms Park must have been designed with Land rover enthusiast in mind for it sports, not only playground equipment and a dunny, but also a little road with its own ford for splashing through.  We thought that a nice touch.

The camp site was wonderful.  Perched on the side of a hill, this was the view first thing in the morning.  Need we say more?