About a day’s drive south of Mataranka we stopped for an overnighter at the Sir Charles Todd Memorial Overland Telegraph roadside rest area. This is a basic stop on the main highway and can’t be missed because of the big purple drinkable water tank.
It’s quite a large sealed area and probably plenty of room for about 20 rigs. We arrived at around 3pm and there was only 1 other rig, but by the evening there about 12 in all. Being right next to the road the traffic noise was a bit loud but it really didn’t bother us.
It had clean flushable toilets but make sure you take toilet paper with you. It also had one shelter area with a good size picnic table which later became occupied by backpackers. No other services are available including phone reception.
This rest area is close to the spot where the final join of the Overland Telegraph Line was achieved in August, 1872. You will also find a monument known as the Telegraph Memorial, which commemorates Sir Charles Todd, Post Master General, Superintendent of Telegraphs and Government Astronomer of South Australia.
We enjoyed our overnight stay as we chatted with other travellers but especially a young lady from Sweden who camped in her little car tucked safely away behind out van. She was driving a car from Melbourne to deliver in Darwin. Her story was awesome and she had travelled 850 kms that day.We invited her to join us for a drink and we had the best night chatting with her.
We decided to head off a little earlier than normal the next morning and stop for breakfast at Newcastle Waters overnight rest area a short drive further along the road. This was the other spot we had been thinking of stopping for the night and wanted to compare the two areas.
It was a much smaller area than Sir Charles Todd and the road noise from passing traffic was more obvious and the toilets actually made me feel sick. But then unfortunately this happens in other areas too.
From here we drove to our next stop at Daly Waters Pub which you can read about in our previous post. From Daly Waters we headed to Threeways for more fuel and then onto Barkley Homestead for the night. It was a long day’s drive as we did stop in a few places to take some photos and stretch our legs.
Along the way we stopped to see if we could help a young English couple travelling in a Motor Home. They had run out of fuel as they misjudged the very long distances between fuel outlets. Unfortunately we could not help them as they were using different fuel to us. With no phone service we told them that they would probably be better off taking a lift back to Threeways with someone heading in that direction.
They thanked us and said they would flag someone down. As we left we were able to stop another traveller going in there direction. After telling him about the couple’s plight he said no problems he had a couple of jerry cans on the back full of fuel and would be able to help them out.
Below are a list of others places we have visited that may be of interest to you:
-
- Alice Springs NT to Broken Hill NSW
- Boken Hill to Sawtell – NSW
- Crossing the Nullarbor
- Free Camps – Broken Hill to Cobar -NSW
- NSW – Free camps, Donation camps, Showgrounds and Caravan Parks 2019
- Northern Territory – Free camps, Donation camps and Caravan Parks 2018/2019
- Queensland Road Trip 2017/2018
- South Australia to Western Australia 2019
- South Australia trip 2017/2018
- Victoria 2017/2018
- Western Australia Coastal Trip 2018
- WA’s Got the Lot 2019
Cheers
Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram
Happy Aussie Caravanning Lifestyle
Dixie and Graeme