Thunderbolt's Way is named after Australia's Gentleman bushranger, Fred Ward, alias Captain Thunderbolt. Ward was wrongly jailed twice, and sentenced to work gangs on Sydney's scandal-ridden Cockatoo Island. His brazen escape, organised by his part Aboriginal wife, Mary Ann Bugg, launched them on a career of plunder and defiance of laws they considered corrupt. It amassed for them a cult following by oppressed, dirt-poor farmers, and his popularity grew to become a threat to the very authority of the Crown.

Thunderbolts Way covers the scenic inland route from Nelson Bay at Port Stephens, to Inverell in the New England tablelands. It passes through the towns of Raymond Terrace, Stroud, Gloucester, Barrington, Nowendoc, Walcha and Uralla (where the law caught up with him), then north to Inverell and Goondiwindi across the Queensland border.

The Legend of Captain Thunderbolt >>

Thunderbolt's Way Website >>