Day 3. May 7 2024. Deniliquin to Hay: We are here because we are here.

Not a big trip today, but happy to leave the musty feeling of Deni. and head on down the road. We have now learned about the Long Paddock, where the Cobb Hwy replicates the route of when drovers would spend days taking their stock along this path. Australian outback can be spectacular, but this part is just very flat and scrubby. Doing it by horse over weeks would have been a tough gig. Glad they have invented cars …. good job there Karl Benz.

We did look out for an art installation along the way called the Headless Horseman. The story goes a few of the old drovers saw this ghostly apparition around 1880’s. I reckon this was just a few blokes who were bored and were making up stories – probably the original drop bear story! In a miss for technology, where google maps said it was, we also found no torso, no legs, feet or anything at all. There was nothing to be seen. Found out later it was at another place that I thought was a town, but was just a pub – so I better get better at this whole navigation thing if we are going to do the trip we set out to do.

After a head full of road kill we excitedly actually saw kangaroos jumping across the road. While you have to be careful, nice to see some that weren’t ready to become hamburger meat.

Hay immediately had a different feel to it. With the weather pushing a sunny mid 20’s (Melbourne 17, just saying) it was a nice walk through town to the Dunera Museum. The old train station has been renovated and looks a treat, but out the back they have two train carriages set up with information on the Dunera Boys, Detention camps in Hay during the second world war. I came for a holiday and got an education. No idea that this was a thing - before the war started, people fled Germany to the UK as they could see Hitler’s writing on the wall. Great move, however, when the hostilities started – the Brits took anyone with a German passport and put them on a boat called the Dunera, shipped them to Sydney and then trained them out to Hay for Detention camp. Mainly Jewish men, this was their home for a number of years, separated from their families. The Aussies did the same with Italians already here – with Australian citizenship or not - and sent them off to this camp. Only the men, and only between 16 and 60. Wow. Numerous stories, but a theme for them was “they were only there because they were there.” Wrong passport, wrong time, shipped to what was then “the arse end” of the world. Who thought this all stopped with the convicts?

Further walking to took us to the Hay Gaol museum – being a long way from anywhere else is good for locking people up apparently – and while this had been a little shocking with the cells and whole gaol thing not being great, they have shoved a lot of stuff about Hay over the years to gather dust in the old cells. Not sure if the bars are stopping the stuff from being stolen or it just trying to escape on their own.

Nice dinner, and let me say, Linda has pulled out another surprise – yes we have an ensuite site again tonight. 3 nights in a row! This little princess is happy as all get out with our own space, and also the extra power point to plug in the beer fridge. Linda says this is the last one til we get to WA. So tomorrow I guess I will be sharing showers and facilities with a bunch of strangers – but until then – the middle of the night walk is a very short one indeed!

Showering facilities 7/10 – even with an ensuite, a shower curtain will always be marked down.