3/12/21 Murrumbidgee Valley: Balranald to Wagga Wagga

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 Early in the morning I went for a walk beside the Murrumbidgee, which we will follow over the next day or two as we amble toward Sydney.

Come sit for a bit.

The Murrumbidgee was running a banker in Balranald, and as we followed the river upstream toward the minor flood peak more and more of the paddocks beside us were filled with water.

Flood waters.

We dawdled a bit. There's no rush to get to Sydney, after all.  I for one quite enjoyed the wide open spaces and far horizons of the Hay plains. Way off  in the distance a crop duster worked a crop: it was so far away and flew so low to the ground that it was only visible when the plane jinked up at the end of each row to turn around.


Zoom.

We're in Wagga Wagga tonight.  Wagga Wagga is NSW's largest inland city, straddling the Murrumbidgee and also sitting smack bang in the middle between Sydney and Melbourne. This on-the-middle position meant that Wagga was a strong contender for the position of national capital when Federation was being discussed.  After all, argued the worthy Wagga-ites, why start from scratch in a cow paddoch when you had a town perfectly placed between the squabbling sisters of Sydney and Melbourne, with an ample water supply and established infrastructure?  This was not to be: cow-paddock Canberra went ahead and Wagga swallowed its disappointment and voted enthusiastically for Federation anyway.  Wagga remains an important regional centre in part because of its proximity to the Kapooka Army recruit training centre, which explained the inordinate number of young men with very short haircuts ambling around its streets.

We dined in style at a picnic table in the main street and went home to attend to important business like eating iced vovo's with our cup of tea while we watched motel TV.


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