{"id":5711,"date":"2025-02-22T23:24:56","date_gmt":"2025-02-22T23:24:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=5711"},"modified":"2025-12-24T21:52:44","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T21:52:44","slug":"3-head-west-young-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=5711","title":{"rendered":"3. HEAD WEST, YOUNG MAN!"},"content":{"rendered":"

We were trying to emulate the explorative adventures of the early settlers.\u00a0 The Blue Mountains, part of the Great Dividing Range, created an impenetrable barrier inland from the coastal region.\u00a0 It remained impenetrable (to Europeans) until 1813, when Gregory Blaxland, William Charles Wentworth and William Lawson became the first European settlers to successfully navigate a path across the Blue Mountains.\u00a0 It took them three weeks to complete the crossing, but within five years there was a trail constructed suitable for horses and carriages!\u00a0 A little quicker than the construction of HS2 in England.<\/p>\n

By 1820, there were 114 Europeans living on the Bathurst Plains.\u00a0 In only four years, this grew to more than 1,200.\u00a0 Another drought, the arrival of flocks of sheep and the fencing of land disrupted their food supplies to such a degree that the First Nations peoples around Bathurst realised that their way of life was fundamentally threatened.\u00a0 Trouble was brewing!<\/p>\n

Anyway!\u00a0 A fleet of buses had been commandeered to take us to Lithgow.\u00a0 There was a brief stop at Echo Point, Katoomba for more champagne (to keep all of us punters in a state of semi-stupor – and, therefore, fairly happy!)\u00a0 The lookout has absolutely fabulous views of the Three Sisters.<\/p>\n

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I’m guessing that the Prince Henry Cliff Pathway is named after Prince Henry William Frederick Albert, Duke of Gloucester, Former Governor-General of Australia.\u00a0 Not Prince Harry\/Henry of California.\u00a0 But strang things are just possible in this wonderful country.<\/p>\n

At Lithgow, the announcement “The train arriving at platform two is the delayed India Pacific train to Adelaide and Perth” was repeated five times.\u00a0 Between each announcement the train shuffled forward one platform length.\u00a0 After all, 870 metre long trains with 35 carriages rarely stop at the little country station of Lithgow!<\/p>\n

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Coach H eventually pitches up bang in front of us, and we were on.\u00a0 We rattled and banged, swayed and rocked as we got moving.<\/span>\u00a0 Very late and without our checked in luggage.\u00a0 That was on a truck which had taken a wrong turning and had to meet the train in Bathurst in the middle of the night.\u00a0 But there’s another problem lurking there, as we will discover in Adelaide.<\/span><\/p>\n

We said when we rode the Ghan Train from Alice to Darwin that we would never again take a long distance rail trip on Australian heritage railways.\u00a0 But time fades memories – and here we are!\u00a0 However this trip has cemented that resolution.\u00a0 We rattled and rolled all night!\u00a0 As we disembarked, a number of passengers for Perth offered us their cabins.\u00a0 They were not looking forward to another two nights on the “Rattler”!<\/p>\n

But, we wanted to visit Broken Hill and we had decided it was a bit too far to drive on this occasion.\u00a0 Pulling into the desert township at just after 7 am, nearly an hour late, we had no idea that the train would have flown straight through had we been delayed by another five minutes.\u00a0 If it’s not there by 7.15 am, it doesn’t stop!<\/p>\n

The walking tour of town was guided by the local drag queen, Shelita Buffet.\u00a0 We were a bit worried that the experience might be a bit odd.\u00a0 But, in the event, the tour turned out to be the absolute highlight of the trip.\u00a0 The town was much more genteel than we expected.\u00a0 Wide roads and some lovely old buildings which are now protected with blanket heritage status.<\/p>\n

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Shelita was a big girl!\u00a0 She had an encyclopedic knowledge of the town’s history.\u00a0 Well, she has been doing this tour at least once a week for eight years – so I suppose she should have!\u00a0 Her sense if humour was superb, just what was needed!\u00a0 She showed us the post office …<\/p>\n

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… the town hall with the only gargoyl in town …<\/p>\n

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We had morning tea at the Trades Hall.\u00a0 (Never too early for a glass or two of champagne – it was approaching 8 am by this time after all!)<\/p>\n

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We heard stories of the town’s mining history including some of the industry’s biggest industrial actions.\u00a0 Broken Hill sits on one of the world’s largest lead, zinc and silver deposits.\u00a0 There are still two highly mechanized mining operations in town, but with very limited employment opportunities.<\/p>\n

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One of the old wooden pit-head structures has been dismantled and “remantled” in one of the town’s carparks.<\/p>\n

One of BH’s other claims to fame is that it was home to Pro Hart, a famous artist.\u00a0 One of his larger works depicts a giant ant.\u00a0 For me that’s another piece I don’t need at home!<\/p>\n

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As we headed back to the train, we passed the historic Palace Hotel.<\/p>\n

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Originally built as a temperance coffee emporium, the hotel was used as a stop-over for the characters in the 1994 Australian iconic movie, “Priscilla Queen of the Desert”.\u00a0 It was this film that inspired the drag-artist tours.\u00a0 Fabulous murals apparently adorn the interior walls.\u00a0 Sadly, we didn’t have time to see them.\u00a0 Must watch the movie!<\/p>\n

So, we’ve been and seen Broken Hill.\u00a0 I have to say that a longer stop would have been much better.\u00a0 It was a fascinating place made even better by Shelita’s commentary.\u00a0 But we have a train to catch.<\/p>\n

Has our luggage caught up with us?\u00a0 Don’t ask leading questions!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We were trying to emulate the explorative adventures of the early settlers.\u00a0 The Blue Mountains, part of the Great Dividing Range, created an impenetrable barrier inland from the coastal region.\u00a0 It remained impenetrable (to Europeans) until 1813, when Gregory Blaxland,… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thailand-and-australia-travels-in-2025"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5711"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5711\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5732,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5711\/revisions\/5732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}