Clarence River Cruise - Step 3 - Maclean to Lawrence

A leisurely trip upstream was envisioned to the little town of Lawrence. They claim some amazing statistics there. The widest, narrowest, shallowest and deepest sections of the Clarence River occur at Lawrence. Not content to claim all those badges, a local even informed us that it had been put forward as a potential place for the Nation's Capital. Not much more than a village now, it did provide us with a pub/tavern to visit. This time just for a coffee and chat, in case you'd be worried about our 10:00am visit.

  

Colonial buildings backing onto the River at Maclean & The Rickety Bridge.

The landscape is a little more hilly with small landholdings sloping down towards the riverbank where you could park your boat.

Just before we reached Lawrence we encountered a couple of obstacles: overhead power lines plus the car ferry providing 24x7 service too and fro. Our Cruising guide instructed us to observe the flashing yellow lights and only to pass when they were off as it would indicate that the cables used by the ferry would be slackened, enabling free passage with a 3m clearance midstream. The Bloke did a couple of circles to become familiar with the pattern. We had recently 'met someone who'd 'encountered' the cables so we were very apprehensive and the ferry operator didn't really acknowledge our circling presence which was not at all confidence evoking.

Car ferry on a perpetual loop.

Tranquility

The title of Rickety Bridge is already in use but this single lane bridge could be in the grand final. Even cyclists are warned to dismount.

Reinforcements or repairs?

Hats on the wall of the pub. 

The Lawrence Tavern is less than 15 years old. The traditional old pub, by rights, should have been washed away in the floods. Locals congregated there and had water swirling beneath the seat of their bar stools. There were photos to prove it. Ironically, having survived multiple flooding events it eventually burned down, which shows that you've never got water when you most need it!

An enterprising local was able to get planning approval to build over the riverbank on the basis that it could be built higher than any previous high water mark. They re-tasked a railway turntable to support a circular house. The council couldn't knock them back as they'd creatively ticked every box. A win for the little guy!