Some more about our train trip..

Lunch was served on the train between Nobby and Warwick...

 The land flattened out a bit but that's another range in the distance...

At times the train ran along high ridges with the land beside the lines dropping away to deep valleys

 Look at this magnificent hotel across the road from the Warwick Station...

More buildings near Warwick station

The very impressive front entrance to the station...

A little bit of history here...in 1917, Prime Minister, Billy Hughes was 'egged' by a protester here. The local police would not arrest the thrower, enraging the PM. From that incident he paved the way for the establishment of a Federal Police Force, the AFP .

Old points at Warwick Station. No trains come this way...only excursions...very sad!

More scenes at historic Warwick Station... 

 Views from the railway bridge...

Soon it was time for the train to continue on its journey...

Next stop was our final destination, Stanthorpe.

My dad used to tell me the story of when he was farming at Ballandean outside of Stanthorpe; on Saturday nights the boys would go into to Stanthorpe for a night out...I think he meant a night at the pub somehow! lol The railway line was a busy one with lots of goods trains making their way south. Late at night the boys would hop on a goods train as it trundled through Stanthorpe and hitch a ride for the 30 miles back to Ballandean. He said that sometimes they would fall asleep and the train would carry them on past their station. Because Queensland has a different rail gauge to New South Wales, the 'sleeping beauties' would only get taken on to Wallangarra which is on the border of the 2 states. But dad embellished the story a bit and reckoned they woke up in Sydney! When I was little I believed him too! lol  

My dad walked along this platform once and so did my mum and I...it's rundown and not generally used but the memories are there!

 The front entrance of the station...not quite as impressive as Toowoomba and Warwick and many of the station buildings have been demolished...

This is the bus that we were transferred to for our trip to the wineries...

 First winery was the Harrington Estate Winery...lovely views...

 The beautiful bunches of grapes ready for picking...

 On the hill overlooking this winery we saw this house...as we looked more closely we noticed that the house was built around a Vic Rail railway carriage...

 The next winery we visited was the lovely Rumbalara Winery. The wines here are all African themed names after the owners' heritage. Their Impi is like Baileys Irish Cream, only better. DH and I didn't buy any Impi...but it was tempting! lol

Our day finished with a magnificent dinner at the Queensland Wine Tourism College. More in a later post...