We have left the music zone and have come back to where there is a bit of sanity in the weather.
My last blog took you up to the Saturday night, where, of course, the weather was in the high 30's. And that is just overnight.
Come the Sunday morning and it was obvious that a large part of the caravan park had decided they'd had enough. By the time we stuck out heads out of the van, maybe about 9am, there was already a lot of movement in the park. I would say that probably 20% had already packed up and headed off. Our small section that contained 8 vans was now down to only 3.
It was great to get to the main street and not have to fight for a car park. We strolled along the main street and the festival was well and truly in its dying stages. There was probably still about a dozen buskers singing their little hearts out, but to a very small audience.
We headed up to the Info Centre to get a couple of souvenirs and strolled out the back to the hotel that is behind the Centre. The Longyard Hotel is one of the busiest venues at the festival and it goes almost non stop.
When we arrived there was a band called The Cruisin' Deuces playing on what is called the deck. This is actually a semi trailer with the side up and all of the music equipment is loaded inside. It is a pretty cool stage. They were quite good but the next band playing was called Splashpool. They were excellent. We stayed there watching the performance for a couple of hours. And yes, it was still stinking hot.
After that it was back to the van to rest up before heading out for the final night. We went out for dinner at the local Chinese Restaurant and then to the Last Concert at Toyota Park. Everything today was in slow motion, compared to the last 2 weeks. I couldn't resist a photo of the main street, less all of the chaos of the last fortnight.
The crowd at the concert was probably only a couple of thousand, and the winners of a couple of competitions performed. Probably the highlight was the performance of the winner of the Starmaker competition, Rachel Fahim. She has a great voice.
It was then off home to watch the end of the Federer / Nadal tennis match.
We had intended on taking a week to get home, but the weather forecast for the next 5 days was for temperatures around 40C in every location that we were going to visit. We then decided that we would take the direct route home, as we were well and truly over this heat.
Up bright and early Monday morning and it was already 32C when we left at 8.15. Probably about 75% of the park had left before us. We drove for 5 hours and stopped at a little whistlestop called Eumungerie. It was just a rec reserve and had power and toilets. No water or showers, but we have our own. The temperature was now 40C, and with driving in such heat, the inside of the van was like an oven. There was only a very light wind, so we put down the awning to keep the heat off one side of the van.
The next thing we knew, there was a hurricane like wind gust that swept over the windswept plains and almost tore our awning off the side of the van. We raced outside and the end bars had jumped off their static position. It was with great fear and dread that we put it back to where it should have been and slowly closed the awning. What a sigh of relief we both gave when it closed up, without any apparent damage.
We got up bright and early next morning, being eager to see this windswept, dry, barren desert in the rear vision mirror. We left about 8.30am, with our sights being set on Narrandera or at the outside, Jerilderie. It was another horror day travelling, with the temperature hovering between 35 and 39C for the day. We pressed on to Jerilderie, and were very happy to get the van set up and have a well earned rest. It was awesome, the weather was down to only 31C. What a blessing.
We were not doing any exploring for this part of our trip, just happy to get home to the sanity of Victorian weather. We left Jerilderie about 8.30 and headed off for our last trip. We stopped at Elmore for a coffee and then again at Avoca for a bite to eat. We went into the shop that boasts about 50 different flavours of pies. They have won a few competitions over the years, and I can verify that their egg and bacon pies were very tasty. Sorry, but your intrepid travellers weren't into trying out the crocodile, buffalo or emu flavours.
It was then off for our final leg of the drip to beautiful downtown Hamilton. The final day of our travels were quite enjoyable. The temperature never got over 22C. How awesome is that. Down from our top of 44C in Parkes, which by the way, is bloody hot. We got home to Hamilton about 4pm after a couple of quite long days.
I suppose I will now have to assess our trip. I thought the Elvis Festival was great, with lots of buskers and plenty of free shows at the clubs. I think the atmosphere was awesome, with plenty of look alikes strolling the streets, and everyone being in a total party mode. I think some of the paid performances were a little bit expensive, especially when you compare them to the Tamworth concerts. Would I go back again, yes, probably.
The Tamworth Festival was also a great experience, with the amount of buskers in the streets being triple what was in Parkes. I just couldn't get over the fact that lots of the buskers were in groups only about 20 metres apart. It became difficult to listen to just one band. During the festival we became fans of the Celtic Fiddle Band, String Loaded. If you get a chance you should listen to then on the internet. We also really enjoyed The Hillbilly goats, Chad Morgan and The Mc Clymonts. From my point of view, the festival went too long. Maybe I went too hard, too early, but 10 days was too much for me. Would I go back again, probably not.
Thanks to anyone still reading this blog.
Until next time.
Keep safe and well.
Barry and Deb.
