Day 3 on the road, Cobar to Wilcannia.  When planning our outback trip, I decided tonight’s stop would be Wilcannia as the online reviews I read were good. However, whilst on the road, the stories were different. Speaking to other fellow travellers Wilcannia had a terrible reputation. Everyone except one person said,

“Don’t stop there!”.

At the Cobar campsite, we chatted to a travelling butcher who delivers meat to all the outback towns. He often stops at Wilcannia and he said the locals there are some of the nicest people he had ever met.  We decided to take the word of someone that regularly visits Wilcannia, as opposed to those who simply drive straight through. Wilcannia was our destination today.

Definitely in the Outback Now

From Cobar to Wilcannia is only 260km on the Barrier Way, so I decided to add a minor detour of 61km to Mount Grenfell for lunch. Once leaving the highway it was supposed to be a dirt road. As we drove along I kept waiting for the tar to turn into dust, but it didn’t happen. I was starting to doubt my navigational skills. Were we on the right road? Even the GPS didn’t know where we were. Eventually, after 30km, we hit the dirt and a sign to Mount Grenfell. Phew! I can read a map! Later we discovered that the road had only just been tarred. Ah ah mystery solved! 

Reaching Mount Grenfell

Mount Grenfell was more than just a lunch spot diversion. It is actually an historic site, famous for the Aboriginal rock art of the Ngiyampaa people. It was a short, easy walk to the sites. We found 2 sites very easily by following the walking track, but we nearly missed one. Luckily, Ian accidentally stumbled across it, whilst exploring the watering hole. 

Can you spot the emus?

The rock art was very impressive on the rocky overhangs, I especially loved the emus and the hands. I would definitely recommend visiting Mount Grenfell and it is great the tar road will open this historic site for more travellers to enjoy.

Aboriginal Hands Panting

After our Aborginal rock art detour, Ian continued on the road to Wilcannia. After yesterday’s gear stick incident someone, no names mentioned, is still banned from driving. There are no towns between Cobar and Wilcannia. The only thing we saw were 100s and 100s of feral goats. They were very camera shy, so every time Ian got close to them, they scattered into the bush.

Bye Bye Billy

The only civilisation between Cobar and Wilcannia is the Emmdale Roadhouse. It was a good pitstop to cool off with some ice pops and use the little girl’s\boy’s room. There is a campsite here, which some travellers favoured instead of Wilcannia. However, we decided to ignore the rumours and continued on our way. We would rather be closer to Broken Hill and have a shorter journey tomorrow.

Pitstop at Emmdale Roadhouse

Around 6 o’clock we reached Wilcannia. Before settling into our campsite for the evening we decided to fill Suzie up with petrol. Wilcannia was like a ghost town, we hardly saw anybody on the streets as we drove to Wilcannia’s BP. The BP is 24 hours, and outside normal hours it is unmanned and you have to use PRE-PAY.  A little challenging, but Ian managed to work it out.

BP Wilcannia

At the petrol station, we picked up the heritage trail map. History buffs would love Wilcannia, it was once an important river port. We followed our map to check out some of the old buildings. There were some beautiful sandstone buildings and sadly, some that needed a bit of loving. After our quick history tour, we headed to our campsite, Victory Park Caravan Park.

Wilcannia’s Historic Post Office

Due to arriving a bit late, we picked up a key at the front gate and found a spot for the evening.  It was a pretty spot on the Darling River, under blue gum trees, and a quiet, uneventful night. In the morning we caught up with the friendly caretaker to pay our dues. We discovered the campsite had only just reopened after being completely flooded, so we were very lucky to have stayed there. Apparently, as the water subsided, the whole area was filled with lots of fish and yabbies, which were collected by the locals to fill their bellies.

Home Among the Gum Trees

Give a dog a bad name is certainly true of this little outback town. From my googling (checkout out Aussie Towns: Wilcannia) and chatting to people on the road, there were issues a long time ago. And sadly, it has been hard for Wilcannia to shake its bad reputation. However, I enjoyed my brief visit and I won’t be bypassing Wilcannia if I happen to this part of the world again.  There is a lot of potential to this forgotten place and hopefully soon tourists will help bring some much-needed money into this outback town.

Info: Day 3 – Cobar to Wilcannia via Mount Grenfell, distance 323km. On the road, a full day due to the 66km round detour to the Mount Grenfell Historic Site, stopping at the Emmdale Roadhouse and a brief heritage trail around Wilcannia. Stayed at Victory Park Caravan Park. Unpowered site $15 / powered site $25. The toilets were a little out of date, but clean and had everything we needed. Also, a free laundry, so a handy place to clean all your dirty clothes.