On leaving Texas, which is a border town, we drove into New South Wales. Burren Junction and Pilliga Bore Baths are another two of our favourite swimming pools, so we spent a relaxing week at both these baths. After having three days of dust storms and strong winds, driving to Burren Junction, we had the rest of our first day at Burren Junction inside DABUS, getting cabin fever. The following morning we woke to sunshine and warm weather, but bloody flies. We had very few flies in Queensland and certainly needed to pull out our fly squatters once back in New South Wales. So the week at the bore baths we have lovely warm weather and enjoyed chatting to fellow travellers about all of our travels. The cost of staying at both is $5 per night, which is cheap for the facilities, available to travellers.

Driving towards Coonabarabran, we commented on the first sighting, for a extremely long time, the slight colour of green in the paddocks. On chatting to a local butcher he was saying that they had had just a few showers but they certainly needed more rain.

Our stopover for the night was at Coolah; were we stayed on the local golf course and it was free. After a stretch of the legs around town, we decided to enjoy a cooked dinner at one of the Coolah Valley Hotel. We woke the following morning to rain and cold, freezing weather. The winter clothes were unpacked from under the bed. We haven't seen or felt weather like this for ages. We travelled the day with constant rain, which must be blessing for the farmers. Travelling through Gulgong and Mudgee before stopping the afternoon at Ilford, again getting cabin fever, as we couldn't get out of DABUS for the rain. Crossword puzzles and Skipbo were what helped pass the afternoon away. Ok…… and the drinks at happy hour certainly helped.

The following morning we stopped at Sofala, a historical township and one were we had driven through once before. The weather was nice to us, so we got out and walked around this quant little town. Next stop was at Bathurst. DABUS did another lap around the Mount Panorama Racing Circuit and did a PB, coming in at just over 10 minutes; our last lap was 12 minutes.

Travelling through rolling hills we stopped the night at Lake Oberon, were the wind was icy cold. Gloves, winter layers, wine, rum and a fire kept us warm for the late afternoon. We were going to stay here for two nights and then decided we wanted to be in Canberra on Friday and not on the weekend. From Oberon the scenery changed so frequently, from beautiful lush green rolling hills, to gum trees, pine plantations, steep mountainous roads, paddocks full of sheep and young lambs and pretty quaint townships. It certainly was a very picturesque drive through Taralga, Crookwell and our stop for the night is Gunning. The countryside is so different to the dry, barren and drought affected farmlands of Queensland and northern New South Wales. We haven't seen green grass since we left Darwin and its so good to see so much healthy livestock.