Australia’s longest river offers one of NSW’s best outback drives.
One of the great Australian urban myths is that our nation has at its centre a ‘dead heart’. This myth was fathered by the early explorers who saw the country through European eyes and passed back to the coastal settlements the conviction that the interior was ‘a scene of awful desolation, a sterile solitude, without a trace of verdure or sign of life’ (Augustus Gregory).
The notion that inland Australia is a desert, devoid of life or human interest, lingers to this day. And yet it is nonsense. The outback seethes with life, but it does not surrender its treasures easily. To understand the subtle pleasures of this land requires patience and stamina.
The English explorer Ernest Favenc wrote, “Repellent as this country is, there is a wondrous fascination in it, in its strange loneliness, and the hidden mysteries it might contain, that call to the man who has known it, as surely as the sea calls to the sailor.”
This ‘wondrous fascination’ is familiar to the thousands of retired Australians or ‘grey nomads’ who take to the road each year and find that once they have started exploring, they can’t stop. It’s the same compulsion that drove men like Mitchell, Sturt, Stuart and Leichhardt to return again and again to the great unknown.
Mitchell was the first European to set eyes on Australia’s longest river. The Darling rises in Queensland’s Darling Downs and traces a leisurely course 2,700 km across the arid NSW outback to greet the Murray at Wentworth, on the NSW/Victorian border. It travels under several passports — the Dumaresq, Macintyre and Barwon — before assuming its more familiar title at Bourke for the journey south.
The river meant food for Australia’s first people — yellowbelly, cod and silver perch; to the early Europeans it was a vital link in the supply chain for the great exploratory expeditions to the interior and then a trade link for a burgeoning farming community.
Today, the Darling is still vital to the livelihoods of the handful of communities that line its shores, either for irrigation or for drawing the tourists who follow in the footsteps of Mitchell, Sturt, Burke and Wills.
It is possible to trace the Darling south-west from Bourke to the Murray through some of NSW’s finest outback country. It’s a drive of around 700 km (add another 300 km for side-trips to Broken Hill and Mungo National Park), mainly on dirt roads. Although these roads are accessible in dry conditions by conventional two-wheel-drive sedans, 4WDs are recommended because rain can transform the road surface into a mudbath in a matter of hours.
This route passes through some of the most historically significant settlements in NSW — Bourke, Menindee and Broken Hill — and two of the State’s finest national parks — Kinchega and Mungo. Allow at least a week and be prepared to stop frequently. Park the car almost anywhere along this route and you won’t have to walk more than a few metres before you will find one of Favenc’s ‘hidden mysteries’ in the midst of this ‘strange loneliness’. It might be a lizard, an emu egg, Sturt’s desert pea, an Aboriginal coffin tree or merely the bleached bones of some long-departed beast but it will be there if you take the time to look.
The river itself is an unreliable travelling companion, often wandering off when you would be grateful for the company and drifting back when least expected. Its sluggish pea-green waters provide good fishing and there are excellent campsites along its banks. Other accommodation options along the route include tourist parks, national park huts, station bunkhouses and historic motels and hotels.
After the long run from Bourke via Louth, Tilpa and Wilcannia, the flickering lakes around Menindee are a welcome counterpoint to the dust and the dry desert plains.
The ‘Birdman of Menindee’, tour operator Geoff Looney, credits these waters with almost mystical powers: “You can be sick as a dog and you come up here and you feel better immediately,” he says. “I reckon I should market it as a cure.”
Looney runs birdwatching and fishing trips on the lakes and riverways that form the Menindee Water Storage Scheme. Sunset over these waters is an event that should not be missed. (In fact, the grandeur of the sunsets alone is ample reward for any outback trip.) Pelicans mass offshore while spoonbills mine the shallows for supper and great crested grebes paddle wearily to port. The skeletons of drowned trees are backlit by the sun’s final flares and an infinity of stars waits patiently in the wings.
The settlement of Menindee was the last outpost of civilisation for the tragic Burke and Wills expedition before their bid to reach the Gulf of Carpentaria in 1860. The explorers rested at Thomas Paine’s pub, now the Maidens Hotel, and left a significant part of the expedition team here while they struggled north to Coopers Creek and beyond. The hotel is still there but fire and progress have altered it beyond recognition.
An hour west of Menindee on a quick bitumen road stands Broken Hill, built by miners and now apparently peopled mainly by artists. The famous Line of Lode, which dominates the city skyline, has largely been mined out — a single working mine is all that remains. However, tourism and the arts are emerging as economic saviours.
The city is home to around 70 or 80 working artists, including Pro Hart and many talented indigenous artists whose work is displayed at the Thankakali Aboriginal Corporation. A visit to Hart’s gallery is a must — his collection includes works by Picasso, Constable, Lindsay, Nolan and Boyd, among others. Nearby Silverton, familiar from TV commercials and movies such as Mad Max II and A Town Like Alice, is also home to several galleries. Above the city, Sculpture Hill is a fabulous spot to watch the sun sink into the plains.
Where is it: the Darling River Run stretches some 700 km from Bourke to Wentworth (not including side-trips to Broken Hill and Mungo National Parks — add another 300 km).
When to go: March–November is the best time to visit. Summer temperatures are fierce.
Where to stay: for something with a local flavour, try the Outback Beds network of stations. Stay on historic sheep and cattle properties and experience real outback living. Ask at visitor centres for more information.
How long will it take: allow at least a week. Relax and take your time.
Road conditions: dirt roads can be impassable or closed after heavy rain. Call (08) 8091 5155 for an update if bad weather threatens.
More information: register for the ‘Great Outback Touring Route Guide’ program or contact Tourism New South Wales on 13 20 77 or visit www.visitnsw.com.au
More great drives: for more information about the Darling River Run and 16 of the finest adventure drives, get NRMA’s Great Driving Adventures, available from book stores or by mail order at www.nrma.com.au
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