23 Jan 10 - Kinchega National Park, Menindee

By Lou: After the disappointment of the Darling River being flooded south of Bourke we were keen to christen our tinny. (I had thought flood was a good thing for a boat but apart from riverside camp grounds being underwater, the fish tend to scarper so no fun fishing.) Despite an extensive lake system of empty lakes, we did find a beautiful spot on the banks of the Darling at Kinchega National Park. I made Craig do a solo trip in the tinny to check it actually floated because we got it for a bargain price and I go by the adage if it seems too good to be true it probably is. On this occasion I ate my words and Sam and I hopped in for a very pleasant spin down the river. The old 4 HP motor does just the trick. Later the boys decided to go fishing and I stayed at camp. I was shocked to realise this was the first time in a month that I hadn’t been within 100m of either were of them. Space! Yeehah! Managed to write my first lot of postcards. On the second day we were delighted to be joined for one day and night by a family from Packenham who we had initially met in Broken Hill Caravan Park. Craig had spotted them the first time before they even entered the caravan park. He heard a familiar sounding engine, turned and moaned, “Oohh”. It was a Land Rover Discovery towing a van. Short of tears brimming he nostalgically recounted the sad day we sold our Disco and he saw it drive off down the street without him. We struck up a conversation at the pool and Sam had a ball playing with the 6 and 9 year old boys both at Broken Hill and Menindee.