Maclean

 Initially, when I was planning this trip, I thought we would take it easy and take three days to drive the 1200 km (800 miles) home to Hervey Bay. However, as is usual towards the end of a trip, we were anxious to get home to our lovely abode, so we decided to do the trip in just two days. The halfway point was approximately at the little town of Maclean.

Somehow I managed to pick a very old motel in Maclean and it was obvious that it was built in the 50's or 60's and was being done up.

The Clarence River was just down the hill and the motel owners were fortunate that there was a hill because the road below would have been underwater during two floods earlier this year.

The rooms were fine so it was no hardship staying a night. Pickings were slim for restaurants in such a small town so we ate at the local pub and it was fine pub food.

The next morning we stopped by the river to have a look. 

The town has numerous old buildings and before the freeway was built that bypasses the town, this was the main highway north - south between Brisbane and Sydney.

The Clarence River. It has one of the largest catchments in Australia.

It's normally a very peaceful placid river.

The river floods easily and a barrier protects the town from smaller floods. One of the recent floods must have been higher than the barrier because we couldn't find an open petrol station. The pumps had been ruined and the tanks filled with flood water.

We were getting very low in fuel and had to drive twenty miles or so until we were directed to a petrol station that was open. Only one of their pumps was working. The nearby major town of Lismore was flooded twice and recovery is going to take a long time. Parts of the city may need to be relocated to higher ground.

You can read more about flooding in Lismore here.

Once we got out of Sydney, most of the drive was quite easy. Two or more lanes in each direction and not much traffic. Because of speed cameras, everybody travels at close to the speed limit and it's relatively peaceful compared to I-95.

We finished up doing 6276 km. We were very glad we did the trip but we think we won't do it again. It's a lot of driving and it's probably easier to just fly to some big city such as Melbourne and rent a car.

Since I retired 12 years ago, we investigated several of the towns we passed through as possible places to move to from the US. At each place, we decided Hervey Bay was better. It was wonderful to return home with the peace and quiet, the ease of driving around, and the morning sun on the beach.

However, the main impression we had was just how beautiful Australia can be, particularly with so much green after all the rain of the past few months. You just have to appreciate gum trees instead of the European or American trees.