The Little Lap
If a BIG LAP has you flummoxed, then a LITTLE LAP through New South Wales’s JUST-OFF-THE-GRID boom towns and SLEEPY HAMLETS might be the PERFECT ALTERNATIVE.
I FLEE THE CITY in the morning and, by the late afternoon, I wind up the Gibraltar Range, a lush, Gondwana rainforest portal to the Northern Tablelands. Arriving at Waterloo Station, just outside of Glen Innes, I swing open the farm gate, judder across the cattle grid and close it, as per bush custom.
Porchlight beckons me inside the Shearers Lodgings. I yank the old-school cord, which sheds light onto last century: a wicker trunk, wood-panel walls and ceiling, nails hammered in lifetimes ago. Yesteryear’s shearers probably wouldn’t have got much work done if their digs were this good, with an electric blankie on the opulently adorned bed; rainforest shower; and Glow Lab lotions to lather away the work day.
A peachy New England dawn paints the bush. Currawongs warble and sheep bleat yawning bleats. A no-compromise country brekkie is devoured in the separate kitchen, a personality-filled space replete with cooking-show-quality gadgets and bucolic eccentricities, such as the black ram’s head mosaic on the tiles.
FOSSICKERS AND FARAWAY DOMES
I set off for the Australian Standing Stones, a mini-Stonehenge on a grassy hill above Glen Innes, which seems a neatly symbolic place to kick off a New South Wales road trip. Homage to the area’s Celtic heritage (and home to the Australian Celtic Festival), the 38-stone-circle formation is aligned with both summer and winter’s solstices, with 24 of its stones marking each hour in the day. ‘Blue’ fever draws me 50 kilometres north-west along Fossickers Way, past ploughs and steel cows artfully reimagined as letterboxes, to Billabong Blue Sapphire Fossicking Park. There are only a few sapphire mines left out here. “More for you and me,” says owner Bill Dawson, who gives me an accelerated-fossicking course: shovel, sift, wash, hope. I stare olympically for tell-tale blue glints in the pay dirt and, eventually, two rice-grain-sized blue sweethearts wink at me. Jackpot.
I pitstop at The General Merchant in Inverell for a roast duck breast and noodle salad with piquant lime chilli dressing. The buzzing cafe is a paragon of just how far bush-town cuisine has moved on from ye-olde-hamburger-shop days. Fat and happy, I set off to a hill west of town, among bunya pines and Himalayan cedars, to find dignified heritage-hideaway, Blair Athol Estate.
Its five guest bedrooms, parlour and drawing room are busy with a fun floral fusion of period furnishings, including owner Kim Kelleher’s great grandma’s piano. But it’s the pamper-focused day spa that’s the standout. A cheese platter and bubbly to start by the mineral pool, followed by lovely sense deprivation in the open-topped PHloat (float) room – and a massage to finish.
The next stop is Faraway; literally. A subtle dirt-roadside sign 120 kilometres north-west summons me up a fence-following track that crescendos on a ridge of soughing gums in which snuggles outlying glampsite Faraway Domes. The big, white, geodesic dome is a well-considered coalescence of luxury and off-the-grid credentials, including ingenious ventilation and a composting loo-with-a-view. Oodles of natural light from the valley-facing ‘bay window’ gift the interior a Byron-esque glow, illuminating a four-poster king bed that stares straight down a valley even vaster than the property’s 3642 hectares. I take in the view from a confounding range of bum-parking options, from the wooden stools around the kitchen island, to beanbag-like softies outside.
Discarding my monogrammed robe, I settle in Faraway’s pièce de résistance: the balcony bathtub.
MORE IN MOREE
Southwards, fighting dome-sickness,
I pass Warialda (‘place of wild honey’), a postcard of a bush town: awninged-pubs, immutable buildings, utes mascotted by panting pooches. Onwards, 35 kilometres east of Moree, I rendezvous with Scott from O’Dempsey’s Tours outside what looks like an enchanted forest.
Stahmann Pecan Nut Farm is immense: all 700 river-hugging hectares and 105,000 trees of it. Each year, 2500 tonnes of pecans are shaken from the lofty North American hickory-timber natives, so they won’t miss the few handfuls we forage and crack open in our bare hands. I depart exactly three pieces of Mrs O’Dempsey’s pecan-and-date slice heavier.
From edgy murals to an Art Deco streetscape, Moree wears its art on its sleeve. You will struggle to keep your credit card holstered at not-for-profit Café Gali (at Yaamaganu Gallery), which serves crisp coffee, divine light meals and a rich staple of local Kamilaroi and on-consignment pieces from Indigenous art centres. At BAMM (Bank Art Museum Moree), one of the country’s best regional galleries and host of the touring 2019 Archibald Prize in 2020, you’ll find a rich contemporary catalogue that collides with a plethora of Aboriginal cultures. The ornate pressed-metal ceilings are worth looking up for, a reflection of past agricultural booms.
Moree’s traveller focal point is its fabled artesian baths, now housed within the thoroughly modern Moree Artesian Aquatic Centre; complete with hydro-play area and a 10-metre-high waterslide for the kids. Thousands habitually flock here for the zinc-and-magnesium-rich, 38.5 to 44-degree underground water: rainfall from generations ago. I circulate the centre’s private Wellness Retreat with a can-work-miracles attitude: sauna catharsis; giggly water-jet heaven; cold plunge-pool reawakenings – repeat.
Nearby, Maslina Bar & Grill’s elegant, minimalist setting could easily slot into a big-city foodie scene. Coincidentally, its luscious, bountifully portioned Mod Oz cuisine (my pick: roast lamb rump with lentil-and-anchovy emulsion) is perfect fuel for tomorrow’s hiking adventure in Mount Kaputar National Park, 90 minutes south across shimmering black-soil plains.
FISHING AND TRAWLING
Sawn Rocks’ ‘columnar jointing’ formation (a lava-cooling anomaly) makes it the park’s most rewarding walk (30 minutes). The pentagonal basalt pillars collectively stand up from the protected woodland gully like a herculean church organ. I only grasp the Nandewar Range’s true sub-alpine scale at the zenith of a road which slithers close to former volcano Mt Kaputar. From here, I scramble up one of the more challenging tracks, The Governor. According to unprovable legend, you can see 10 per cent of New South Wales from up here. I wind down family-friendly Dawson’s Spring Nature Trail, ideal for glider-spotting by night, and home to giant hot-pink slugs after decent rainfall.
Next, onto Narrabri Fish Farm’s 100 artesian-water-fed ponds, full to the brim with Murray cod, perch, catfish and yabbies that end up on plates from Cabramatta to China. Post-tour, owner Rick Cunningham whips up a feast of freshly caught chilli yabbies with ‘aquaponic’ fertilised salad, featuring homegrown lemongrass and a chilli sauce that lives in a glass skull.
AR-MID-ALE
The tour-de-food rolls on to Armidale, after a three-hour drive through pint-sized towns with dreams in their silos. Café Patisserie’s owner Nathan Walker, who cut his teeth in hatted restaurants, returned to his hometown with his French partner Enora to share scrummy and stubbornly French-from-scratch pastries and breakfasts. My La Complete – a Breton-style galette (savoury crepe) filled with soft egg, ham and two cheeses – exceeds its grandiose name in flavours and comfort-food qualities.
Twenty kilometres south, I stroll into Armidale’s rarefied backyard, Dangars Gorge, a parcel of pristine woodland and twitcher’s paradise where Rufous whistlers and white-eared honeyeaters chorus, lyrebirds sing and echidnas ‘scratch’. I wander along a ridge-top path to Rock Wallaby Lookout for a glimpse of Oxley Wild Rivers National Park, a deep gorge network best scrutinised from above aboard a Heli Gorge Tour with Fleet Helicopters.
Back in town, I browse NERAM’s (New England Regional Art Museum) Hinton Collection, an impressive array of 19th- and 20th-century Australian paintings, highlighted by several Arthur Streeton works and (my favourite) cheeky one-time Archibald contender The Yellow Gloves by Esther Paterson. Over at Saumarez Homestead, the White family’s mansion, set on 10 hectares, stands basically as the family left it last century. Inside the Edwardian homestead’s 30 rooms is the best a pastoralist fortune could buy, from ornate music boxes to quirky one-offs, like a ship’s bracket clock (worth about $60,000). Even the rose garden is heritage-listed, with around 600 varieties on display, including 12 that Maggie White herself bought back in 1892 from Double Bay; they have the receipt.
In search of distinctly local refreshment, I head to Great Hops Brewery, which outwardly resembles an aircraft hangar but indoors is a crafty mancave. Owner Sam has magpied near-and-far idiosyncrasies, from the old Chinese Restaurant sign from Bellingen to vintage floorboards he used to make the bar itself. There are 12 beers on tap, four of them served from a vintage fire engine. The mid-strength has a particularly local quality: ‘Ar-Mid-Ale’. Meanwhile, other local taphouse, The Welder’s Dog, attracts an energetic mix of beer lovers, serenaded some nights by live acoustic acts. Quality crafts like Napoleon Complex Hazy Session IPA and Farmhouse Ginger Beer are served by barkeeps who really want to be there.
My final stop is one of Australia’s best regional stays: Armidale’s Tattersalls Hotel. Bespoke Art Deco reboots don’t come any slicker. My Chancellors Suite is swathed in stately lounge furniture in muted mauves and soft, green velvets that almost glow in the adroitly diffused light. Its luxuriously shaggy rugs demand my bare feet. Exquisite metalarch doors, which separate living and sleeping spaces, fluently drag me back to a time when style was less encumbered.
Tattersalls’ sleek restaurant is a masterclass in invigorating retro ambience. I order a traditional French onion soup, a main of monkfish and a Negroni from the classic cocktail list. It’s funny, but country New South Wales is way more effortless and well rounded than I remember.
To discover more about doing a Little Lap in New South Wales, visit visitnsw.com