79-year-old horseman plucked from bushland near Grafton

Westpac Rescue Helicopter rescues man stranded in the state’s north more than a week after he ventured into dense bushland on his horse.

Newton Boyd and Dalmorton (pictured) is located on the Old Glen Innes Road which runs between Grafton and Glen Innes. Photo: Brooke Haynes

A 79-year-old man has been flown to safety more than a week after venturing into dense bushland on his horse.

Police were notified on Saturday afternoon that a man needed rescuing from a hut at Newton Boyd, west of Grafton, after he ran out of supplies and couldn’t leave the area due to a rising river nearby.

The man had been on a horseback trail ride and had left more than a week ago.

On Sunday afternoon the Westpac Rescue Helicopter was tasked to assist and, with a critical care medical team on board, searched the remote trails within the Newton Boyd area.

The man was located uninjured and was winched out of the area and flown to Old Dalmorton School where police were waiting.

Newton Boyd is located on the Old Glen Innes Road, once the primary route between Grafton and Glen Innes, and the area is rich in history.

The Old Glen Innes road, which Newton Boyd is located on, was once the only way from the coast to the tablelands. It passes through this hand-carved tunnel near the historic goldmining township of Dalmorton.

In the mid to late 1800s the area was awash with goldmines and Dalmorton was once a gold mining town with 5000 residents – and 13 pubs.

Along the route, which criss-crosses many of the tributaries which feed into the Clarence River, is a spectacular tunnel which was carved straight through the mountainside and constructed completely by hand in the 1800s.