Warrumbungles Failure | chossclimbers.com

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Road trip sights.

We’ve been monitoring the various park webpages for two months prior to the trip and were aware of the various warnings and cliff closures in the Blue Mountains. We were therefore surprised to find out that the Warrumbungles National Park had closed on the day that we were driving there; a precautionary measure as there were no fires nearby. There we were – stuck with a prearranged Airbnb place and nothing to climb; at least not within a day’s driving distance. We checked out an appealing formation on the edges of the park, Timor Rock with no closure signs, and tried making our way to the backside where the handful of routes were reportedly located. The horrendous bushwhack turned us around (apparently Australia has some venomous snakes?). We bummed around the sleepy town of Coonabarabran frequenting their bottle shops and did some road trips including a long run to Newcastle and its ocean beach. We were also looking at our next planned destination, The Blue Mountains outside of Sydney, and the progressively worsening fire conditions. A day prior to departure we got an email from our prearranged place asking us to reconsider coming and offering a full refund. And so we changed plans and after three days of relative boredom headed south for Horsham in Victoria some 12.5 hours away.

Photos

Welcome to Coonabarabran, NSW; the jumping off point for the Warrumbungles National Park (Dec. 2019).

Closed, closed, closed (Dec. 2019).

Warrumbungles National Park – views from an overlook which happened to still be open. Belougery Spire (right) and Crater Bluff – both home to some longish routes (up to 10 pitches). Next time (Dec. 2019).

The very appealing looking Belougery Spire (Dec. 2019).

Warrumbungles National Park (Dec. 2019).

White Cockatoos in Warrumbungles National Park (Dec. 2019).

An emu on a farm outside of Warrumbungles National Park (Dec. 2019).

And his cousins (Dec. 2019).

Getting lost somewhere in New South Wales during one of our slow days in Coonabarabran (Dec. 2019).

Town meeting (Dec. 2019).

Roo watching from the side of a road (Dec. 2019).

In flight (Dec. 2019).

“What?! Where??” (Dec. 2019).

Random road-side sights (Dec. 2019).

A sunset jog (Dec. 2019).

Though we could not climb in the closed down Warrumbungles National Park, our rented cabin in Coonabarabran kind of kicked ass (Dec. 2019).

Downtown Coonabarabran, NSW (Dec. 2019).

Timor Rock on the outskirts of the Warrumbungles National Park (Dec. 2019).

On the short drive from Coonabarabran to Pilliga Pottery settlement (Dec. 2019).

The hippie settlement of Pilliga Pottery outside of Coonabarabran; reportedly established by German immigrants sometime back (Dec. 2019).

Some of the wildlife (Dec. 2019).

There were some easy hikes starting from Pilliga Pottery; some pretty barren terrain and a few overlooks (Dec. 2019).

A wood-stone interface (Dec. 2019).

More sights from the short sunset hike (Dec. 2019).

The flora around Coonabarabran (Dec. 2019).

Renting something with a kitchen in Australia seems like a good deal as take-out and/or eating out is pretty expensive (Dec. 2019).

Looking for something to do (Dec. 2019).

New South Wales (Dec. 2019).

A black wallaroo (Dec. 2019).

Some town along our drive from Coonabarabran to Newcastle (Dec. 2019).

Newcastle – burgers and beach time (Dec. 2019).

Newcastle, NSW. After the burgers, we hit the beach for like an hour or two. Then 4.5 hours back to Coonabarabran (Dec. 2019).

Roos (left hand valley) coming out at sunset (Dec. 2019).

More roos (Dec. 2019).

The elusive, two-headed, Siamese deer with underdeveloped front hooves (Dec. 2019).

Hard to resist stopping and taking photos (Dec. 2019).

Some town in New South Wales along our drive. Note the yellowish haze (Dec. 2019).

I think parrot is called a galah (Dec. 2019).

The smaller sized, black kangaroo (Dec. 2019).

Starting the long (~12+ hour) drive from Coonabarabran, NSW to Horsham, VIC (Dec. 2019).

Some random rest area in NSW where we noticed the highest temperature on the car’s thermometer (Dec. 2019).

Sending temps (Dec. 2019).

West Wyalong, NSW (Dec. 2019).

A dust bowl (Dec. 2019).

Very arid – hard to imagine farming or ranching in this climate (Dec. 2019).

Farmland randomness (Dec. 2019).

More randomness from the long drive (Dec. 2019).

New South Wales (Dec. 2019).

Hay, New South Wales (Dec. 2019).

Small town Australia in Hay, NSW (Dec. 2019).

Aussie & Thai – pretty decent (Dec. 2019).

The long drive took us over long stretches on unpaved back roads (Dec. 2019).

“Hey ladies. Y’all here alone?”

Long but reasonably interesting drive (Dec. 2019).

A glowing sunset (Dec. 2019).

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