Dubbo

We left Singleton and headed to Dubbo for two nights.  Our main reason to go to Dubbo was to visit the Taronga Western Plains Zoo.  We had heard so much about it and were told we had to see it.
We found a great free camp spot right by the river, only ten kms out of Dubbo called Terrumungamine.  Pretty popular spot.  We set up along the road, and tested the new generator out, all seems to be working, cross fingers it copes with the workout it'll get in the heat.
We got up early and headed to the laundromat to wash a few wet sheets (we had no water so couldn't use ours).  Got to the zoo about 1030.  Just in time to get to the elephant talk.
We opted to ride our bikes around the zoo, you could drive or hire carts but we were game and hoped the kids would last.
Western Plains Zoo is a fabulously laid out zoo.  Plenty of space for the animals, meaning we covered quite a few kms in a day.  We headed straight for the elephant enclosure.  We listened to a informative talk on elephants and watched the keeper feed the female African elephant called Cuddles.  The kids loved it.  And of course so did mark, as everyone probably knows they are his favourite animals.

Cuddles

The view across the "Savannah"

These are Siamang Apes.  They were my favourite.  Man they were crazy animals.  They are incredibly territorial, they puff up this echo chamber under their chins and let out these almighty screams.  You could hear them kilometres away.

Me doing the 'turtle' sign from sign language (about the only thing I remember from a course I did years ago).

The kids did an amazing job riding around the zoo, they must have rode 5km plus

We had a fantastic day the sun shone all day.  The kids didn't whinge too much and we saw some amazing animals.  Would definitely recommend it to any one heading that way.  We enjoyed it so much we went back the next day for an early morning guided walk around the zoo.  It meant getting the kids out of bed at 5:30am.  But it was so  so worth it.  A guide took us behind the scenes and we got to have a much closer look at a lot of the animals.  The giraffes had just gotten out of bed and we got to get so close to them, they kept watching us as though we were the exhibit!  There was this awesome little gibbon who put on this performance for us swinging through the trees and acting up, he was fantastic.
We took the kids to the gift shop after.  Jake chose a little stuffed elephant that he named Eli and Charlotte chose a lemur that she called Susan, they have been hanging out to buy toys as we have been holding off letting them buy too much every where we stop.  Then we had breakfast at the zoo, very yummy.

This is a black rhino, looks the same as a white rhino, they are both grey!  Apparently the British mucked it up in translation and they were being told wide lipped rhino not white rhino.  OOOPs.

The giraffes have this mammoth shed to sleep it.  It has markers up the side up to 5m, apparently they have never had one that tall though.  It put it into perspective just how tall these animals are when you stood right in front of them.

Dubbo proved to be a definite must see.  Well worth the 4 hour drive to get there.  Kids and adults had a smashing time!!!!!