Day 3 Sunday 5/5/2024 St Arnaud, blue skies 7 – 21

While Woody walks, VeeWee and I drive out to Carapooee to see the pebble church that was built by my great grandfather and the other farmers and miners of the locality. We drive down back roads trying to identify the land that my family once owned and comparing it to the historic online property maps later, I’m pretty sure that we did pass the old property.

Back in town we have a coffee at the busy Shire Cafe that occupies the old shire offices. It’s chilly but delightful sitting under the gently falling yellow leaves of the Robinia trees, but it’s too nice a day not to check out some of the beautifully restored old houses of which this town has many. St Patrick’s Convent sits high on a rise above the town, those priests of old certainly had an eye for real estate.

I had read about the last of the original miner’s cottages, Love’s Cottage and so decided to take a walk up there. VeeWee’s two poodles have every dog in every backyard talking, it may have been a quiet Sunday arvo, but not anymore. Eventually we find a twisted and rusting heap of corrugated iron “Is this it!?” Says VeeWee. I am excited beyond words. As we walk back through town we find an old style garage that is open and VeeWee pops in to see if they could possibly have a look at the Iveco, but she’s curtly told that they’re booked out until June.

Not to be dejected, we take a drive up to the St Arnaud cemetery to pay our respects to my 2 times great grandfather and 6 of his grandchildren who are buried here. I had been agonising of late over getting a memorial plaque for the graves, but it seems that another branch of the family (great uncle Tom’s line) has beaten me to it. It’s comforting to know that our mob are not the only ones who ‘remember’ them.

We have happy hour in the camp kitchen and chat with a woman who has recently camped at Heyfield, one of our favourite spots. A local told her that the town spent $70,000 setting up the amenities for RV’ers and already they have recouped their outlay from campers’ donations. And that’s not counting the money spent in local businesses. Small towns do benefit from welcoming RV’ers.

Dinner is egg skirt dumplings cooked in the wok.

Accom $35.00 Fuel $42.42