The Dubbo Chronicles ... 2nd Road Trip

Last week I was away again on another work trip, travelling round various new emergency departments and gathering feedback from them about their designs (what works well, what they wouldn't do again, and why). We start the schematic phase our plans for the new department next month, so it was important we concluded all our R&D this month. Which has meant that I have got to see more of the state on my 1400km round trip.

It was a sunny morning when we set off from Dubbo, north towards Tamworth.

As we headed north the miles and miles of arid land started to green up a little...

 Above: View just outside Coolah.

Below: View around about Premer.

When we arrived in Tamworth we discovered it happened to be the Tamworth Country Music Festival week. So after a few hours at the ED there, we headed into town to grab a bite to eat and look around...

The awards for the festival include the Golden Guitar Award, hence the large golden guitar. It is somewhat obligatory to have one's photo taken next to the big guitar, so we did...

After an early night we set off at 7am for our next destination, Port Macquarie, on the east coast...

The scenery started off fairly similar to that of most of the western NSW area, but then little by little gave way to greener pastures and forest...

 Above and Below: Views soon after leaving Tamworth.

Below: Views as we started to enter the Cottan-Bimbang National Park.

There was a steady climb up hill as we went through the forest, which was full of ferns and eucalypts, including some quite old ones...

There were signs along the way warning drivers to beware of Kangaroos, Koalas and even Wombats.

Through the forest we started out descent to the plains of the east coast...

It was a lot greener on this side of the mountain range...

After arriving in the early afternoon and spending a couple of hours at the ED there, we took a break and I managed to go to the beach for the first time in 3 years I've been here...

Although there were a couple of beaches with marauding children and loud families (being school holidays), there were also several which were strangely devoid of people, even though the adjacent bays were heaving. 

This is Rocky Beach, just above Flynn's beach...

I took a coastal walk along all of the beaches...

 

The walk took me past Sea Acres Rainforest National Park...

Which is where I came across this strange bird on a track, which I've since found out is an Australian Brush Turkey...

Eventually I made it past Miner's beach up to tacking point light house...

The lighthouse is Australias 3rd oldest.

Tacking point was named by Matthew Flinders on his circumnavigation of Australia in 1802. 

Above: The original lighthouse plans.

I climbed down the hill on to the rocks to get closer to the crashing surf...

Having finished by coastal walk I headed inland and was surprised to find a field full of camels! Not what I was expecting, but evidently camel rides are quite popular.

The next morning we set of to Sydney to visit a further two EDs there.

It was a fine sunny morning, but the trip was long and the scenery unchanging. The road unfortunately does not follow the coast, due to the coves and peninsulas, and so it was the freeway all the way down to Hornsby.

Concluding our business for that day we checked into the hotel. What a view...

Above and below: The view from my bedroom window by day and by night.

The following day, after visiting our last ED we headed back west to Dubbo. It took us 6 hours, and as we drew closer to home it was clear a storm was setting in. We made it home before it started pelpting down with rain, and I managed to get some dramatic stormy pics as we drove...

Above and Below: Views near Lake Windamere.

 Above "Lone Tree 1"

Below: Stormy Hill

 Above: "Love Tree 2"

Above: "Rain on the horizon".

This coming week we are off on an overnight trip to Wagga Wagga, to see the new ED there, which has only been open for 2 weeks. It's great to learn from one's mistakes, but its even better to learn from those of others. Hopefully we can avoid many pitfalls in our new development by doing the rounds. 

Beyond the Black Stump: A NSW Road Trip...

Sorry dear readers about the lack of posts last month, but I have been kept busy with some different activities around Dubbo...

Last week I took a road trip with a colleague around western NSW with the purpose of visiting the new hospital at Tamworth ahead of its opening next month. This was to get ideas and advice, as we are now planing the construction of a new hospital at Dubbo, including a $150M emergency department. Over the next few months I will be visiting other recently opened or about to open emergency departments to help plan the layout etc of our new one. I also took the oppurtunity to stop at some of the smaller hospitals and health services in our catchment area to meet the GPs there and look at their facilities. On the map above we started at Dubbo, 7 O'clock on the red ring, and travelled counter clockwise around it. We first stopped at Dunedoo and met the staff there and looked around their hospital before travelling through to Coolah to look around the hospital there. We stopped for lunch their and then headed northwest past the black stump...

Most people in Australasia will be aware of the colloquialism "beyond the black stump" which means someone lives in the middle of nowhere. This is the site of the original black stump outside Coolah which gave rise to the saying.

We traveled on past hundreds of kilometers of varying countryside, which was nice as I had formed the impression that most of the greater NSW area was barren red dirt, but a lot of it is arable farmland with a mixture of grazing stock...

We arrived in Tamworth by nightfall, and then met the staff at the emergency department the next morning, where we discussed several issues facing healthcare in our areas before taking a tour of their new department. I can remember taking the walk-through of the new department at Waikato before it opened. It is very odd to walk through a space so empty and still which you know will never be that way again once it opens. Here are a few pictures...

Above and below: Views of the nurses and doctors stations in the main acute areas.

Below: The treatment cubicles in the acute areas.

After our tour we set off for home, travelling from Tamowrth at the top of the loop left towards Gunnedah, then through Coonabarabran and Gilgandra before making it home again at night fall...

We did encounter a few minor obstacles on the way - it is never comfortable rounding a bend to find cattle strolling across the road...

So May was a fairly busy month, punctuated by some different tasks rather than the daily grind on the ED floor. Having experiences like this and opportunities to be involved in creating a new department and taking on more leadership roles really makes the job worthwhile as it is something which most people don't get to do as early on in their career, so it makes one feel a valued part of the team. In the coming months we are going to visit St George in Sydney, and Wagga. 

Hopefully I will be able to share some pictures of the progress at WBP this month.