Bellingen

Postcode: 2454

Bellingen is a small town (pop 2800) on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, Australia and the seat of Bellingen Shire Council. It is approximately halfway between the major Australian cities of Sydney and Brisbane. The Bellingen area is a mixture of valley, plateau and coastal environments.

Bellingen is known by citizens around the area as "Bello". Bellingen township lies on the not-quite-spelled-the-same Bellinger River; this different spelling was originally suggested as being the result of a misinterpretation of some poor handwriting. In fact it results from an ongoing German tradition to have the name of a river ending in "er" and the related town name ending in "en".

Bellingen was one of the filming locations for the 2003 comedy film Danny Deckchair, written and directed by Jeff Balsmeyer. Bellingen was also the notional setting of the book Oscar and Lucinda written by Booker Prize winning author Peter Carey. The film version of Eucalyptus (novel) was set to be filmed in Bellingen as well before it fell through.

In fact Bellingen has a strong affinity with the arts and is home to four festivals: the popular Global Carnival (often known simply as "The Global"), the Jazz and Blues Festival, Stamping Ground Dance Festivaland Camp Creative.

Bellingen is home to well-known current events reporter George Negus, writer Victor Kelleher, pianist David Helfgott (subject of the film Shine released in 1996) and author Steve Biddulph. Australian cricketer Adam Gilchrist was born in Bellingen.

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