Day 126: Whitton to Jugiong

 

Of the 3 possible routes to Jugiong, we chose to go via Junee, which is the most direct and allows us to visit the Junee Liquorice and Chocolate Factory on the way through. Arriving at 11am it was perfect timing to stop for a cup of coffee and stock up on chocolate coated liquorice and ginger.

Junee Liquorice and Chocolate Factory

As is Saturday, the venue is quite busy with people coming in for coffee, brunch or lunch. There is live music to entertain the crowd.

After coffee we continued on to Cootamundra, the birthplace of Australia's most famous cricket player, Donald Bradman. Most of the towns tourist attractions revolve around cricket and Bradman.

The drive from Cootamundra to Jugiong is very scenic, hilly, windy and in need of repair. However is is great rural scenery with the canola crop starting to flower. The Ford's navigation software couldn't handle all of these minor roads and we ended up using Apple maps, after being directed to drive through someone's property along a gated unsealed road.

Jugiong appeared as we came over the final hill and we arrived at 1.30pm. We parked in the Jugiong Recreation Reserve free camping area and wanted across the road to have lunch at the Long Track Pantry.

Long Track Pantry

Jugiong is very busy. Both the Long Track Pantry and Sir George Hotel are popular dining venues, particularly  on weekends. Although there are a lot of interstate cars parked in the street, most likely, travellers passing through. The Recreation area already has a lot of caravans set up and they are still arriving in numbers.

Tonight we dined at Sir George Hotel, we had booked ahead because our previous experience had been it absolutely books out on weekends. Our experience this time was quite different. We booked a dinner table for 6.30pm, and went to the bar for a pre dinner drink. It was clear all was not well, but we got our drinks and sat in the bar. The next customer was told the system had gone down (computer says no), and they could not take any orders for food or wine until it was resolved, as they had not system to cope with such an obvious risk. After about 10 minutes they announced thatbthey could take cash, if you had the exact amount. The queue kept growing, the bar staff had no idea what tondo, and the manager was hiding in his office to try to resolve the issue. Its was more than 30 mins later that the problem was resolved and the EFTPOS machines worked again. Welcome to the future, who would believe that people had cash and were happy to pay, but unless you had the exact amount, there was no service ?

There was elation when it was declared the EFTPOS machine was now functional and people could again spend money !

The meal was great, the experience not so great. The wine recommended to go with our slow cooked pork shoulder was a local wine, inspired by the Dog on the Tuckerbox at Gundagai, but the grapes apparently come from Mudgee . It was first experience of a 2025 vintage Shiraz, obviously not time to have a short exposure to oak barrels.

Whilst we were waiting for our meal, the intrusion alarm on the Ford Everest went off and I received an alert on my watch. I headed back over to the recreation area and sure enough the lights were flashing but the alarm must have silenced. The car was still locked and a quick inspection internally didn't raise any concerns, so I reset it and went back to the pub.

During our meal the alarm went off again. Concerned about the disruption it was causing in the campground, I again went back to the car. This time I found a moth flying around inside the car obviously triggering the movement detection cameras. Getting rid of the moth solved the problem.

The Sir George at Night