5 January 2012 - Day 1 in Dubbo

On Thu 5 Jan we started our Dubbo visit with a trip around the old Dubbo jail. This was excellent and even the kids enjoyed running around the building and looking into the cells. I had expected we would have to leave after 15 minutes with them bored to tears but we managed to spend a good couple of hours wandering around.

We lunched in the park behind the Tourist Information Centre and found the obligatory swings for the kiddies. Em and Lachie will definitely be swing and park connoisseurs by the end of this trip. In the afternoon we headed across to Wellington to visit the caves. Nice set up, although the caves themselves are showing the signs of wear and tear from the amount of tourists. Outside the caves we found a small herd of Shetland ponies with a few foals among them. This was probably the highlight of the day!

Before heading into the caves, it was getting black with storm clouds. The first drops of rain started as we got back to the car. It started raining heavily in Wellington but it looked like it was OK over Dubbo direction as we headed back. Unfortunately a different storm cell had hit Dubbo and the tent did not escape the rain. We had not put the side covers of the tent down and expected everything to be soaked when we got back. Luckily we managed to get away with a just a wet pillow and a sheet on Em's bed. Some more heavy showers hit later in the evening and we were better prepared. With the sides of the tent down, it was quite pleasant listening to the rain on the canvas and overall it coped pretty well.