Darling River – Wilcannia

Wilcannia

Having enquired of a fellow traveler, we found Wilcannia to be as said: very few white fellas in the main street and a significant area of the town boarded up, the glass being smashed.

Bread and milk at the store and advice where to find the tourist info office. Tourist info was at a one stop shop: the shire office, the bank and tourist info, a great combination.

The two dirt roads from Wilcannia to Menindee (150km) were closed following rain the other day and the caravan park is across the bridge. That’s the info we needed. We decided to stay the night and proceed to Menindee in the morning via Broken Hill.

Bridge over the Darling River at Wilcania.

At the caravan park, the caretaker’s home is in stilts a good couple of metres above the flood plain.

The gentleman was waiting outside the garden gate, leaning on the boot lid of a small red car with his cash box and recipt book, having seen us coming while accomodating the previous arrivals.

A quietly spoken and helpful fellow, he advised that it might be quieter on the side of the park away from the river. Sounded like good local knoweledge and worth heeding, though as we drove around the typical circut the travelers already camped looked pretty much like quiet, grey nomads, just like ourselves.

As Lesley paid the fees, I observed the caretaker’s wife, obviously Aboriginal, come down the stairs to quieten the dogs and a girl about eight year’s old appeared on the veranda, also obviously Aboriginal. A closer look at the caretaker and I reckoned he’d also pass for Aboriginal. I felt good that this family had it together.

Well, the grey nomads camped along the river bank knew something that I didn’t. They were camped on kikuyu grass while we were on bare dirt with burrs and bindi eyes everywhere. We tramped the prickles into the caravan and they got all over the mat and from there into our socks.

On the high bank, straight across the river, is the bowling club. Country style music started cranking out of a powerful sterio soon after dark and kept up till midnight. I was pleased to be camped with the burrs and bindies onn the quieter side of the park, away from the other greynomads with their carpet of kikuyu grass.

At one time the sterio went quiet for a couple of minutes while a new CD was arranged. Although there was music in the background, the recorded voice of the entertainer let out a fair bit of excited exuberance in the form of shouts and hollas as he got himself and his audience into the swing of it, the noise carrying around the town. This was enough to set all the dogs within several hundred metres going. What a racket!

The mighty Darling River was a dissapointment.

The mighty Darling, reduced to a muddy trickle by drought and water harvesting.

Just downstream from the caravan park is the bridge. Two bridges actually: the old bridge that used to raise the deck to allow the paddle steamers past and the new bridge.

At the top end of the park is a low weir, less than a metre high.

The water is a murky off white white colour from the clay sediment, allowing vision only an inch below the surface.

I found it depressing to view this once mighty river on which paddle steamers went a further five hundred kilometres to Burke and beyond, reduced to such a pityful state.

An old redgum log washed up high on the bank of the Darling River at Wilcania.

Way upstream in Queensland there is a huge dam, providing water for cotton growing. This harvests most of the water of one arm of the Darling and is a signifacant factor in the low flow of the Murray River, of which the Darling is a tributary.