Today started with a bit of a slow morning, because the day was going to be spent just exploring what Cooma had to offer – with only a couple of specific plans in mind.
At about 8:30am we started to wander from where we’re staying, in an area apparently known as the “Royalside” of Cooma (the earliest parts of the town, on the southern side of the town) into the centre of Cooma. We stopped off at the Southern Cloud Memorial along the way, which tells the story of the disappearance and crash of the Southern Cloud aircraft near Cooma in 1931, and the discovery of the wreckage some 26 years later. It also had some great information about the history of the Australian National Airways – the first commercial airline operated by Charles Kingsford Smith.
After grabbing a coffee, we wandered further into town hoping to head to the Corrective Services Museum, which is a part of Cooma Gaol. Except it seemed like it was closed today. So after a bit of disappointment, we kept wandering further into town and dropped into the information centre to find a few things to do – and then we learnt that the Corrective Services Museum opens at 10:30 on Tuesdays! So a quick visit to the local Salvos to find a bargain of a Kathmandu warm jacket for Eliza, and a few books as well, plus a play in the park while I walked those back home, and then we were ready for the Museum visit.
It was a simple display, but incredible stories, and detailed some amazing bits of corrective services history throughout NSW in particular. Normally, an inmate at Cooma Gaol would be our tour guide, but the manager said to us that unfortunately there’s no one currently staying at Cooma Gaol who is the right fit for the tour guide! So we self-guided through the exhibitions. There was plenty of information about the history of incarceration and prisons in NSW – including the change from the barbaric conditions where inmates weren’t even allowed to make a sound, through to more modern times far more focused on rehabilitation.
At the end of the tour is a gift shop, but with a huge difference: the majority of items in the gift shop were artworks made by current inmates at Cooma Gaol. Some of them were incredible! And 75% of what we paid went directly to them. We loved a lot of pieces, but ended up selecting a really beautiful coastal scene painted on ply. Looking forward to finding somewhere for it to live when we get home!
We wandered back home to pick up the car for the afternoon adventures: off to the Snowy Hydro Discovery Centre, which I’d certainly been looking forward to seeing (via Woolies for some cheese & bacon rolls for lunch). It was a really extensive display that told so much of the story and the history of the Snowy Hydro Scheme, including all the work going into Snowy 2.0. They had some great question sheets and clipboards for the kids, which thankfully kept them occupied, because most of the display was just text and pictures on big boards – still fascinating, but definitely would’ve been a big effort for the kids without having something to do. We ended up spending about 90 minutes there all up.
It was still only early afternoon at this point, so we headed off to explore a couple of lookouts – firstly up to Mt Gladstone, about 6km south of town, and then we came back in to Nanny Goat Hill, which is just a short walk from the centre of town. We really couldn’t work out why it’s called Nanny Goat Hill – but there’s a statue of a goat there… so, ok?
We headed home for a bit of down time and for the kids to start some of their diary writing. But Debbie had the idea of heading back up to Mt Gladstone to watch the sunset – and it was such a great idea. Incredible views over such a huge part of the region, and the sunset was just spectacular!
We’re finishing up our time in Cooma tonight, but we’re not quite done with the Snowy Mountains yet – there’s still another day and a bit of Snowies adventures ahead.
