Mungo National Park

(Balranald – Mildura Region)

27th to 30th December 2004

First up was a visit to Marie-Therese’s grans place, on the Murray River, in a twin town called Mulwala-Yarrawonga. Its about an 8 hour drive from Sydney via Wagga Wagga and Albury. The town is built around a weir on the Murray River, which forms Lake Mulwala, pics of which are below. Weird lake because they didn’t pull out the trees before they flooded the area! Bloody Victorians!!

After a leisurely overnight stay, we headed north-west towards Balranald via Tocumwal, Finley, Deniliquin, Dahwilly, and Moulamein.

The road from Mulwala to Balranald changed from flat land with irrigation ditches to flat land with NO irrigation ditches. And by flat I mean flat….

Balranald was the final food/fuel stop before Mungo National Park. Should have fuelled up before we left, but with half a tank, and Mungo only 150 kms out and we were getting great fuel economy, I figured we wouldn’t have a problem. Lucky I was carrying two 40 litre jerry cans!

Balranald was also the changing place for the vegetation. No longer were we travelling thru flat, grassy, semi green areas. It changed to rough, grey scrub, with true desert red soil. Our first taste of remote area desert travelling……

The road out from Balranald to Mungo was remote, not another car seen until we hit the Mungo visitors centre, but that’s another story.

Some Mungo locals…..

The road to Mungo is pretty much a 2WD road, except if its been raining. It wasn’t, so it was 4WD high range (only for the road hugging effect) and 80 km/hr. Probably not a good idea since I had been driving for 7 hours already, it was 7pm ish, and the local wildlife was out looking for dinner!

Didn’t hit a thing, but the road was interesting. Gravel to red clay to wind blown sand on the clay to gravel. 4WD came in handy on some of the tight bends. Coming up to Mungo, we rapidly approached a slow BMW, flashed our lights, and overtook them, leaving them in a cloud of dust…..hahaha, non 4WD’ers!

Mungo National Park is an interesting place.

Visit the Visitors Centre to pay your park entrance and camping fees…bring some change as there’s no one there to break a fifty. Could’ve of asked the French tourist, but he was still pissed at me for “flying past too fast”. Went on to barrage me with why I shouldn’t drive so fast, etc etc, but we just gave him one liners and ignored them. Him and his girly would soon become our travelling companions….

Payed our fees, ignored the tourists some more, then took off to the camp ground. Mungo has two camping areas, one right near the Visitor’s centre – Main camp(fires are permitted) and one in the park itself (but no fires permitted). Both have long drops, with plenty of flies, and nice views out the doors, well from the male toilets at least.

Stayed the night in a nice spot in the Main camp ground, lugged out all the camp gear, set up the tent, and settled in for Marie-Therese’s first camping experience since puberty. Lucky for her she was with me!! I can already hear the remarks…..

With the tent set up, we headed back to Mungo. I had read that sunset was the best time to visit the Walls of China. Past the Visitors Centre, past the historic woolshed, and along a chalk rock gravel road to the parking area. Plenty of kangaroos and emus along the road. The road itself runs along the lakebed, which obviously is dry now (dry for about 80 million years I think!)

Next day we drove the 70 km loop road around the entire lake, crossing onto one of the other dry lake beds. Long drive, but some brilliant scenery. On the lee side of the Walls of China is the sand dunes built by the constant erosion and wind….

And a complete 360 deg view from the top of the sand dune…..

A view of Walls of China from across the lakebed, some 40-50 kms, with the heat “mirage effect”…see the reflection on the water?

The woolshed….

Some local plants and fruit (??)

We left Mungo, headed west to Mildura for a fuel stop, but as we were running on the last of the two jerry cans of petrol, we detoured and headed south towards the Mildura-Belranald road hoping to hit paved road before we ran on fumes, but we reached Balranald with plenty to spare. Filled up and then drove east another 5 hrs on the Sturt H'way till we hit Nerranderra and stayed in a caravan park, where we set fire to the BBQ……but that’s another story….then onto Wagga and back to Sydney. A total of approximately 2,800 kms.

Back home at Marie-Therese’s place, we surveyed the damaged caused by the trip into and out of Wagga’s locust plague, it was like driving thru a miniature meteorite belt, locusts instead of meteorites of course!

The End