4 pedals & 4 paws: Gunnedah to Warialda

Gunnedah to Manilla = 68km cycled Monday 17 May
Manilla to Barraba = 48km cycled Tuesday 18 May
Barraba to Bingara = 63km cycled Wednesday 19 May
Bingara to Warialda = 41km cycled Thursday 20 May

Cummulative total = 2002
Since we weren't able to get internet since the start of the week I thought it would be easier to do the blog as a cycling block so as you can see from the map we have covered about 200km over the past 4 days. Basically following the Fossickers Way.
We left Gunnedah on a cloudy Monday morning and rejoined the Oxley highway. Since it was Monday there was a lot more traffic compared to Saturday - really it was 30km of absolute hell on this highway - heaps of trucks and cars that were reluctant to give us room and a highway with virtually no shoulder to seek refuge in! And to top it all off Kouta was moving about alot and we couldn't figure out why. So I was getting very fed up with Kouta by the time we got to our first break at Carroll - his throwing himself around at the back was continually throwing us into the line of the traffic or off the road completely!
I thought once we had a break at Carroll he might settle down but he didn't and only got worse. The town of Carroll is a little weird - nearly every house there has some sort of junk yard asssociated with it! Not too sure how the small town survives but we did see a sign saying 'Carroll Cotton Gin' so we think there maybe cotton grown somewhere around there. There was also alot of cotton trucks carrying cotton on the highway and judging by the amount of cotton balls alongside the road I think they left half their load there!
After the break at Carroll kouta was still jumping around there was one point along the highway where we were going up a small incline and into a headwind with no shoulder and he just jumped from one side to the other that I nearly got off the bike and threw it on the ground ... but I didn't and instead I threatened to make him get out and walk, by the time we got to the top I had had enough and told Neil that I was pulling over to let Kouta out. We pulled over to a layby and I went to get him out and I realised that he had just 'shat' in his basket!!! I am not kidding ... the poor thing had the runs and that is why he was all over the place in the trailer. Of course I just fall to pieces as I cannot handle doggy doo so poor ole Neil had to try to clean the basket as much as possible, meanwhile Kouta was out and about trying to get rid of the rest of his doo doo that is in his system and then decided to start 'skiing' around the layby trying to clean his bottom!!! I just thought OH MY GOD what next!
Lucky the turnoff for Manilla was not long up the highway from here and I tell you it was fantastic to get of the Oxley Highway! The road was a back road and it was lovely and quiet and in got condition too! It was rolling alot but that was easy. You could see the ranges and faintly see the start of the dividing range. It was very cloudy and it did look like threatening with rain and every now and then you could feel one or two drops.

We got to Manilla which has a population of around 2000 the town has these really nice ornate street name signs and the town itself seemed a nice enough place. The campground was quite good - it would have been better if it wasn't for 2 foreign back packers that seemed to have taken over the kitchen so we just went in there to boil water and cook dinner!
Kouta by now had settled down and Manilla didn't have a place to buy another dog basket so neil washed his current basket and that just sat outside in the slight drizzle trying to dry! So poor ole Kouta had to sleep on his blanket all night but eventually he ended up either on my sleeping bag or Neils!
We woke the next morning to fog instead of frost! It looked like the fog was lifting and you could feel the sun and then another lot of fog would roll in so we didn't get started until around 9.30 which didn't really matter as it was a short day to Barraba.

The fog wasn't so thick when I took this photo but sometimes you could hardly see 20m in front of you! So we climbed out of Manilla to Upper Manilla which was 12km away. The hill wasn't hard just long and continuous but luckily not steep. After the up hill there was a small down hill but you could feel that you were continually and gradually climbing and we did this to our lunch spot at 28km. From there it is was undulating for another 10km and then you had a nice gradual downhill into Barraba which is 554km above sealevel so we did alot of climbing today! although we didn't start at sea level we reckon somewhere around the 300m mark! Despite the hills the scenery around here was beautiful yet one thing I noticed ws that it is so dry the ground and fields, in fact you didn't see alot of farming at all - more horses that cattle and sheep!
We got into Barraba just after lunch and it was cold and cloudy (one good thing about the wind was that it was a tail wind for us!). The campground is small and is run by a guy called 'Bobby' - now at first you take a liking to Bobby and then he becomes just down right annoying! this guy spent the first hour showing us around the park and talking continuously about himself! which is fine and dandy if I wanted to know anything about him .. but I didn't! So here we were freezing our butts off listening to this guy go on and on about him and what he likes and doesn't like etc!
So we were relieve when he finally stopped and we could set up camp and warm up under the hot showers which by the way were bore water so the soap wouldn't lather up at all! We are assuming that between Manilla and Barraba towns that there isn't much water around as everyone has tank water and the surrounds are just so dry to look at. So the towns are on bore water and you drink the water from the rain water tanks. I suppose the bore water is unlimited as there are no water restrictions.
For dinner Neil made hamburger patties and then there was a debarcle trying to get the bbq going so 'Bobby' jumped in lecturing Neil about how to start the bbq because basically the idiot didn't want to buy 3 knobs for the burners as they were $30 each and so you had to push the buttons in and turn to get them going and then he just went on and on and on about it and in the end all I wanted to do was yell at him to damn well use his brains and put up instructions but instead he made us feel like we were incompetent ...even Neil thought he was a strange fellow and ended up disliking him! Yes I think he was strange just so many rules for this that and the other and the campground facilities just didn't flow at all - the kitchen light was in the laundry, the dishwashing sink was in the laundry there were toilets here and there ... just no flow at all!
Below is photo of Neil in the evening just before sunset if you look closely he has a new pair of track pants - on this trip he bought a pair of puma tights with him and he thought they would be warm enough but lately they have not kept him warm ... Dad nick named Neils tights as Neils 'mincing' pants but what Dad didn't realise is that there is a pair of shorts to go with them!!!

So we were relieved to get out the next morning even if it meant cycling in thick fog again! Yup that is right we now have officially replaced the frost with fog! My hands and toes were just frozen and I am so looking forward to getting to the warmer climates that I would cycle 100km a day to do it ... but we are not!
Again it was another climb to get out of the town (I am guessing that both manilla and Barraba are in gullys and why for both mornings we have had fog!). So we gradually climbed for the first 10km to the top of Nandewar Ranges which is at 663m above sealevel so we climbed 100m in 10km which is easy going except for the last 1km which was rather steep and certainly got our 'dicky tickers' going!

We had our first stop of the day at Cobbadah and we parked outside this nice little church - not sure if it is still being used but it was ideal as it was in the warm sun!

From there it is sort of undulating (more up than down) for the next 20km and at 30km we pulled over to have lunch ... just a few kms up the road we came across a huge sign saying a deep descent for 1.5km and to reduce speed and that was just lovely because although the decent was steep the rest of the 28.5km was not - it was a gradual down hill into a valley and we just flew down with hardly having to pedal at all ... ah it was bliss after the past 2 days! So we rolled into Bingara alot earlier than what I had anticipated so I could do my washing as I had been cycling in my shirt of the last 3 days and I was beginning to get a bit 'whiffy'! it didn't really matter as I am only around Neil and Kouta and they smelled just as bad as me!!!
So looking at the road ahead to Warialda tomorrow it doesn't look like any major mountain range to climb and I should imagine that we continue to descend as Bingara is at 300m above sea level - so that means we decended 350m in 30km - lovely!

Well I was wrong about decending to Warialda! It was undulating just up and down, down and up all the way to Warialda! But it was okay it was a warm start to the morning (around 10 degrees) so it was pleasant riding but I have to admit my legs were feeling it! Not really alot to look at along the road just a mountain range on each side. At the 15km mark we took a rest stop in a paddock driveway and something I have never seen before occured ... 3 farm dogs were mustering cattle (or hearding cattle) from one paddock to another they were helped by the farmer in his ute, but it was fabulous to watch and those kelpie dogs are just so intelligent - even Kouta was watching them but getting a little scared as he realised that the cattle were being hearded to the gate where we were and eventually he ran and hid near me! Funny enough the farm dogs didn't pay Kouta any attention what so ever!
Below is a photo of Neil with one side of the ranges behind him.

We got to Warialda just on lunchtime and the town is a lot bigger than what I thought it would be and it has optus internet reception!

The council campground is nice, small and clean and only $2 to do our laundry by machine (sometimes campgrounds where charging $4 per load hence why this is only our 2nd time doing machine washing since we left at the beginning of April - don't worry we do hand washing!). We have decided to lash out and get a powered site for the 3 days we are here as it is only $18 per night (at least she gave us the pensioner rate!). It is a good park and this morning there were a few dogs for Kouta to socialise with. Last night a HUGE RV bus with a trailer (at least 2/3 the size of the bus again!) pulled up - everyone watched them park the huge monstrosity and a couple got out of it that were completely over dressed for travelling! Apparently they are a very wealthy couple that can definitely afford the petrol to haul the bus and trailer. I said to Neil that isn't it funny it is not too often you get in a caravan park at the same time what you would call the 2 extremes of travelling - us and them! Us = having next to nothing except the bare essentials and them = having everything including room for a pony!

Below are some photos of Warialda.