Driving the spectacular Thunderbolts Way! Gloucester to Uralla [4K]
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- Опубліковано 28 гру 2021
- Join me on a drive along the very scenic Thunderbolts Way, from Gloucester to Uralla via Walcha. Featuring verdant rolling green hills, national parks cutting through the Great Dividing Range, and wide open pastures on the New England plateau.
![Driving the scenic Macquarie Pass and Illawarra Hwy [4K] - Albion Park to Southern Highlands](/img/n.gif)
It certainly is a lovely drive seeing all the green and the trees. It does get steep in places. Stopping at the lookout close to the top and looking down into the valley below is nothing short of spectacular.
This has lonng been one of my favourite drives/rides. My parents live in Wauchope and I now live in Sydney. When I was just married, I would take my wife to Wauchope via the Thunderbolts and the Oxley - roughly 550km on fabulous roads, either by motorbike (Super Blackbird) or in a little 964 I had at the time. I never bothered her with the trivial details about the freeway, which is about 370km and probably 3 hrs shorter. I still remember the moment she found out! Hehe
We do, however, still love to stay at the Gloucester Golf Club motel, have dinner at the Golf Club and head off to Walcha for b'fast at a cafe next morning and then down the mighty Oxley to Wauchope! So much nicer than any freeway.
Love your vids and big thanks - Dave
Thanks mate, glad you enjoyed the video!
I've traveled this road too and the scenery is gorgeous.
My late mum used to say that after a load of rain the DMR (remember that term) would send out the "cow pat" gang to fill the potholes. They'd get a "cow pat" of bitumen and drop it in the hole and give it whack with the back of a shovel. In the next load of heavy rain the "cow pat" would be washed out of the hole for the process to be done all over again. Eventually the holes in the road get too big and then they resurface the road taking six months to do a 500m stretch.
Grew up on a farm near Walcha about 40km down the Oxley highway towards Port Maquarie, this drive brings back a lot of memories! If you drive here in the evening you got to watch out for kangaroos, pretty much everyone in my family has hit one on thunderbolts way at least once.
I've only driven it once, in the other direction, many years ago. Definitely a Great Aussie Drive.
Wow.. beautiful! Looks so similar to NE Tennessee and SW Virginia here in the states!
It’s a beautiful road just beautiful filming to
What an awesome drive through rolling hills and open landscapes! Loved every second of the video!
There's nothing more fun than following you around on these tours! Love seeing the world through your eyes!
Beautiful rolling countryside. Looks like a great driving road. Nice work on the video.
Nice drive. We used to drive the Nowendoc road a lot, as it was about 30 minutes quicker than the New England highway, and always stopped for some fresh mountain air around the summit (25.33), just after the Tamworth turnoff where the road crosses the main divide at about 1320m. If you want snow in winter, this is a good place to find it.
We liked it best before it was fully sealed, and every trip there was less dirt than the last. Quite an amazing effort as it was mainly built by the then shires of Walcha and Gloucester who both hoped to capture more tourist traffic. Nowadays it is a constant struggle to maintain it, hence all the potholes. About time we drove it again, thanks for posting!
How long ago was it sealed? I only drove it for the first time a few years ago, and it reminds me of Bylong Valley Way. That was a truly awesome drive before it was sealed, and still is now.
Great video. I've done this road many times between Sydney and SE Qld. It's good for some variation compared with doing the full New England highway. Just be careful not to fry your brakes heading from Nowendoc turnoff down to Gloucester. And some of the turns are blind and they are pretty tight too.
I really wish it were that warm here right about now! Great drive through the countryside.
This is serendipitous timing and incredible to experience. Thank you so much! ✨💛✨
We locals still call it Cason's Lookout, now called Pioneer Lookout, overlooking Giro Cattle Station, way down in the valley below the lookout.
no way! thunderbolts way is such a nice route around northern nsw, and one of the parts the green kilometre sign, one of them have a decimal for a typical destination and the wooden outdated bridges are also cool 👍. happy new year!
I enjoyed watching a beautiful scenery of Australia
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Amazing driving my friend, really beautiful sceneries on this route! Cheers and drive safe!
Love this one. I did this drive many years ago & loved it. It pelted snow just South of Walcha which was beautiful. Will do it again one day. Thanks for this. 🙂
Awesome video as always!
Part of that road needs an upgrade 500 potholes on one section
great video！will take my daughters to those beautiful places!
Great video. I drove this several years ago and reached Pioneers Lookout in the late afternoon; the view was magnificent. Unfortunately the latter part of the drive was after sunset as I'd earlier had to visit people in Kurri Kurri and Medowie before heading to Toowoomba.
Cool thanks mate
Are you ever gonna do a second part of the thunderbolts way uralla to inverell cause i would love to see it.
I love roads in Austrália 🇦🇺
The section around Topdale Rd is spectacular when covered in snow! After a decent fall, the snow can remain on the ground for up to a week.
My favourite road for scenic drive. Thanks for sharing.
Coming from either end Gloucester or Walcha make sure to fuel up the car if needed and yourself as there is nowhere in between to do it, unless there have been some changes.
Into the trip at close to 25:35, just past the Topdale Turnoff on the left, you crest the Great Dividing Range at 1342m. Topdale Road runs along the crest of The Great Dividing Range on its' way to Hams Corner, then the Nundle Road follows the crest of the range for quite some kilometres. Perhaps, just some useless information that might interest some viewers who enjoy your trips as I do.
Did the Thunderbolts Way use to have a state route marker? I think it did, as it would defiantly warrant it especially if the the route was shared with the road connecting Gloucester to the Pacific Highway,
I've also got another question to you, Great Aussie Drives, do you prefer the alphanumeric route numbers, or the pre 2013 numerical ones. I personally preferred the old ones because it separated the route types due to it's national significance rather than how nay towns were connected.
Thanks, the Thunderbolts Way has never had a state route marker, though given its importance it can be argued that its deserving of one.
I personally prefer the alphanumeric ones as I find them to be more straightforward - you've got 'M' for motorways (which the previous system did not distinguish), 'A' for routes of national significance and 'B' for those of state significance. Although I don't really like how a number of routes were removed during the conversion (for example the former State Route 90).
@@GreatAussieDrives A funny story about State Route 90, (if it still existed). Me and my family were at Orange in January 2020, and our driver pulled into the Escort Way hoping to go for a drive to the next town. After about 10 mins i told her that we aint going anywhere becuase considering that we were out in the country, most places that go anywhere had a route sign. Then we pulled up in a driveway of a vineyard and set back to Orange. It would have been nice to pull into Forbes or Parkes, and i would have seen the Newell Highway, which im an begging for you to make a video about, and i certainly loved the bit of it in the Burley Griffin way video.
wow, can't get over those potholes, country roads in rural Qld are better than this road. Overall, it is in better condition than I have read reviews of. And it does look like a pleasant drive. We are planning to do this drive in March 2024.
Great drive! How would you compare Light Horse Interchange (M4 Western Motorway at Westlink M7 and Wallgrove Road) in Sydney to Tom Moreland Interchange (also called Spaghetti Junction, Interstate 85 at Interstate 285 and Buford Highway (US 23/State Route 13)) in Atlanta, Georgia, US a 5 level interchange? Here's the full tour of the interchange:
ua-cam.com/video/EUBIdJDoDI4/v-deo.html
Thanks for the comment, Tom Moreland appears a tad more complex from my view as there seems to be separate ramps for the express and local lanes.
The video very good ,but the road really need urgent repairs
Last car U drive in this video
This is about the first video you drove without an A or B at the start of the road name…
Thanks, yes this is indeed my first video thats not part of an alphanumeric route (excepting my NorthConnex special)
Pity Camera is out of focus
I'm confused, it looks to be in focus to me?
Put some new videos