Monday - Day 13 - 8 May 2023

We knew it was going to be a big driving day today - but we had absolutely no idea that it would also be a "huge" day because we saw SNOW! 

Snow day! 

We left Orange at 8am and I admit I was a bit disappointed that it hadn't snowed overnight - it certainly felt cold enough that it could have ... but no, when I looked out at first light this morning, the car park was still black.  Do car parks get covered with snow?  They must, if roads do.  But, back to today - there was no snow in Orange but it was still cold - 2 degrees C, and Ravi was still warning about the possibility of black ice on the road.  We were careful. Especially when we saw the road signs warning of snow (drat!) and ice.  

It wasn't until we were nearing Lithgow that we noticed the hills in the distance seemed to be white on top.  Snow?  Why, yes it was, and we were soon driving with snow on either side of the road.  Thanks to the dash cam and that it takes photos as well as videos, we were able to get some pictures.  We were also able to hear our excitement "Look at that! look at that! It's snow! " - over and over again (without replaying the video).  Our friend M may have noticed our excitement as well when she rang to see if we had encountered any cold weather in our travels. 

We took the opportunity of being within range of telephone towers to make some phone calls as we drove - but we should have kept them for when we were stuck in traffic near the Hexham Bridge for forty minutes or so.  I blame myself for us being in the traffic jam.  I had seen the sign saying there had been an accident and that traffic was reduced to one lane only - but wasn't sure where it was.  When Waze tried to direct me away from the way I knew, I resisted ... that was my mistake - especially since the one lane of traffic was when six or seven lanes merged.  Aaarrrgghhhhh.  We were pleased that the accident hadn't involved us and didn't seem to be too serious - we didn't see or hear any ambulance sirens in the area - and also that we were only an hour or so from our destination when the traffic pulled to a standstill. 

The good news is that we were still at Bulahdelah by 4:30pm, not a bad effort for the drive for the day.  I had had enough by the time we arrived and was happy to have a break before we took ourselves to dinner in the Motel's restaurant at 6:30.  

I'm not saying we rushed dinner but we were back in our room for the start of Night 2 of MasterChef.  We watched the start of the season last night in Orange - including The Project's tribute to Jock Zonfrillo (the  MasterChef judge who died the week before this season was due to start).  It looks like they have a good crop of contestants so we are looking forward to watching this season.  

I spent some time this afternoon going through the dash cam footage from the last few days of the trip and will put the best ones onto the photo blog - as a way of remembering the parts of our Silo Art Trail Tour which weren't Silo Art. 

It will be a short drive tomorrow - we are off to Kempsey where we will stay at one of our favourite motels.  Hopefully I will get the opportunity to take the camera out for a walk around the town and down by the river.