Day 7

7 February 2013

Now I know what Darryl was going on about in the castle! How's the serenity?!

We were googling all last night on where we should go next and Joel found a place called Dorrigo which has a few tourist attractions and is a bit inland for something different rather than being on the coast. It is approximately 3 hours drive from Ballina and if we could go back we may have researched the route we took a little better than trusting the phone GPS to get us there! Tip for all you travellers out there, more than one road leads to where you want to go but it's not always the right road!

Well let me give you a quick picture of the road we travelled on for about 50 kms....

Seriously have a look at all the winds and corners and turns and crap there is on this road, then add gravel for some of the way, sheer drop offs down the side of the mountain, steep mountain climbs and just never knowing where it is going to end! It was a little bit crazy and probably not the safest route; however the rainforest along this road was amazing and it was a bit of a challenge.

After that road I was a little skeptical at what we might pull up to, as we got closer the big luscious green hills appeared with cattle everywhere and rolling valleys and then a big beautiful lodge house which was our destination! The actual camping ground is called Dangar Falls lodge and camping, there is a lodge at the start of the property that sleeps 10 and is for rent also but behind is a nice fenced off area that looks over all those hills,cows and valleys and this is where you can camp. It's $20 a night unpowered and $25 powered.

We set up the camper for a short stay probably two nights so we didn't worry about the annexe etc, which made the set up process much shorter. Which also means that we were able to cook a sausage on the weber much sooner and sit back and relax looking at the amazing view!

What's that we hear? It's the Dangar waterfall and its only a short walk from camp! It is a little steep and uneven but not too bad, we were both in thongs however if we go down again I will put my proper shoes on. The noise is pretty intense from this fall, especially after the rain I assume but it is raging and quite spectacular! There is a short boardwalk which we walked along to get to the falls and then there is some rocky area to walk down to get to the bottom of the falls. Well worth it! We have read of people swimming in here but right now it is friggin freezing! It was quite literally like dipping your toe into ice cold water so unless we get a 40 degree day I don't think we will be doing any swimming in the falls. We took some happy snaps and then walked back to the very top where there is also a viewing platform where you can look down on the falls.

We then walked back through the front of the property where the lodge is and noticed a couple of doors were open....doors led to a flushing toilet and hot shower! Double score!

We have now collected some wood for our fire and we are sitting back and taking in the serenity.... How are we going to top tomorrow?......stay tuned to find out!

 

PS Another tip for fellow travellers - if you are packing up your Jayco camper, always ensure you know where the car keys are! This morning we packed it all up and then Joel says "ok where are the car keys, let's hook it up" and I say "I don't know, last time I saw them they were inside the camper!" There was a few dreaded moments where we thought we were going to have to unpack it all again to find the keys but luckily they were in the car! Good lesson!!

Carly & Joel

 

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