A brief interlude from ‘The Places We Love’ while we try to chase some sunshine.

Day 1 Saturday 14/6/2025 Home to Benalla, 3 degrees clear

It’s an icy morning as we squelch through oak leaves and half chewed bright purple Lilly Philly fruit. The cockies have been lucky, there are more than they can eat this year. The sun shines golden on the last of the oak leaves that haven’t yet dropped.

We take Eastlink up to Lilydale and the temperature sneaks up to 8. The Yarra Valley looks beautiful in its winter colours and bare grape vines. After the climb up through the Toolangi forest the temperature drops back to 4 with fog thrown in for good measure. I must admit we’d both prefer if the car wouldn’t make dinging noises to alert us of the chill. We know it’s 4 you don’t have to tell us. After all the problems of our last Jeep, we tend to jump at every electronic beep and ding. The Melba Highway (named in honour of opera singer Dame Nellie Melba, who lived in this area) has been resurfaced and we’re grateful, it was holier than a Catholic Church a few months back.

Yea is busy with rail trail cyclists and folks having picnics in the park behind the public toilets and now redundant railway station.

We swing onto the Midland Highway and meet more fog around Cathkin. A paddock of black face sheep look like woolly sausages on brown sticks. As always, as we cross the Bonnie Doon bridge over Lake Eildon we check the water levels, and she is down at present. It has been a dry autumn.

Taking the Swanpool road towards Benalla, the paddocks have big old river red gums and sheep. The ranges are a hazy blue and there’s some fluffy cloud about. The roadkill numbers are high, mainly ‘roos and wallabies.

Pulling into the Benalla showgrounds, there’s a footy match in progress and cars circle the oval tooting every goal. Who’s playing? The Benalla Saints and Mooroopna. The ornate grandstand is deserted. The guy on the ticket box isn’t fussed about campers, only footy. Park over there and put your money in the donation box behind the poultry pavilion. We park over there, but someone has knocked off the honesty box.

It’s only a short stroll into the heart of town across the Monash bridge. Sir John Monash designed the reinforced concrete bridge which was built in 1910. What a talented guy he must have been, having designed many bridges in his engineering life. He went on to command the Australian forces in World War One.

Dinner is chicken soup and soldiers (buttered toast cut into 4 even lengths) and it’s 4 degrees outside. In all a chilly day.

Accommodation: $0, Fuel: $64.31, Towing Kms: 245kms

No power, no water, and once the footy finished we couldn’t find an unlocked toilet.