We drove Tourist Drive #19 on 26th December 2021. This took us to Dangers Gorge in the Oxley Wild Rivers NP, Gostwyck and Uralla.
It is nice country for the drive. We pulled into the driveway to the historic house Palmerston, now a vineyard. But we knew it was private property and closed so we turned around. As we did, a hare jumped out in front of the car.
We stopped to look at the Dangarsleigh War Memorial, built in 1921 by Alfred Perrott and dedicated to WW1 people who lost their lives. This included Perrott’s eldest son.
The road to Dangars Gorge is a dirt road and initially it was really badly corrugated. It gradually got better but it was a slow drive in. There were sheep also sharing the road with us.
The great thing about this Gorge is that there are brilliant views so close (300m) from the carpark. It’s amazing. There are three short easy walks from the carpark. To the left of the carpark is the Gorge Lookout, only 100m away. The Gorge Rim walk is about 500m to the lookout, taking you yo the edge of the fall.
The third short walk is across the river to the Dangars Falls Lookout – crossing the wide river above the falls is great as there are little waterfalls and cascades everywhere.
This is the point where the Salisbury Waters falls about 120m to the gorge below.
We walked on to Rock Wallaby Lookout providing great views down the gorge and to the river. I turned back after Rock Wallaby Lookout – what a fabulous area though.
From there I walked on to McDirty Lookout, for more views of the lower gorge. The first half of the walk is through forested areas. Progressively the track rises and I got glimpses of the gorge. It was not until I reached the lookout that I was able to see the gorge properly. It seemed to me a long walk out there and back again to get one view of the Gorge – the last 2 pics below.
On the way back I spent some time rock-hopping is the section of the river before the falls. Very pretty.
Leaving Dangars Gorge we followed the instruction on the brochure for Tourist Drive #19 and turned into Black Lane when we came to it. Wrong move as we went around in circles and eventually came back at the road into Dangers. Coming out on that road we should have turned left and followed Enmore Rd around to Gostwyck. We got half a view of an historic station house – private property.
After about 10km, we saw the octagonal shaped woodshed apparently in full working order and still in use.
The lovely drive continued.
We were soon at Gostwyck station – there is no town, just the agricultural station and a couple of treasurers. We came around a corner and there was the stunningly beautiful Gostwyck chapel in a stone-walled enclosure. This is formally the All Saints Anglican Church, and must be the most photographed structure in the regions. Absolutely exquisite, dressed in its Virginia Creeper. The chapel was built in 1921 from bricks made on the property. The stone wall around the chapel is to protect against flooding.
Just next to the chapel is the driveway to the Gostwyck station, lined with 200 elm trees. They were planted by a man brought out from England to do the job. The trees were watered by bucket in droughts.
Uralla was not far away and we stopped and wandered around the town. We started with the statue of Thuuderbold, and worked our way up the hill. Some nice buildings and plenty of people walking around even if it was a public holiday.
To see a video of Dangars Gorge, click here