New England Big Cats

hi my name is ####### im from kempsey on the mid north coast of nsw i was wondering if there were any reports from my area. the reason i ask is probably 6 months ago my mate and i were up in the mountains that border the new england region on a camping trip, we like explore up around there its a truly untouched up there in alot of areas. it was late afternoon around 5pm and we were heading back towards kempsey from armidale on the armidale road, we turned of on strawberry road heading towards kunderang we followed the road for a bit over an hour looking for the campsite we had earmarked when we got there national parks had locked it so we headed back the way we came. after around half an hour we came around a bend and in the middle of the road about 50metres in front of us was a big black coloured cat with a long tail that was not touching the ground at all it was up slightly, its fur was black but not smoooth it looked coarse almost. i would say it was atleast as big as my dog wich is a mastive so a fair size its feet were big and it looked in very good condition besides the coarse almost matted hair it almost looked wet if that makes any sense. we slowed almost to half our speen and it slank off into the scrub almost hugging the ground. There were no footprints at the time but since i read in my local paper that a man found footprints on his farm near the river and photographed it and thats why im e mailing you. Im one who beleives in what he see's not hears my mate and i were gobsmacked to say the least we were in total and utter shock my mate kept saying over we didnt just see that did we, its just one of those things that you would never have thought you would see but we seen it, im so convinced in what i saw i would take a polygraph test no problem as you can imagine its not something that we talk about alot as its a taboo subject in australia in other areas such as victoria and the blue mountains and we just didnt want to be seen as crazy. we asked a couple of people who know the area and its history and there is apparently a report from a very long time ago about a circus train that overturned on the armidale road on its way down to the coast and lost 3-4 panthers other animals were recovered or destroyed apparently i cant give an exact date for that but the armidale road was the 1st road that led to the coast from the new england area and was the only road up until 1930 odd i think the terrain is rough to say the least there is plenty of water and game to be had with kangeroo's wallabys and even deer. i dont know if this helps you in anyway it helps me i needed to tell someone else its the strangest thing thats happened to me and i just cant get it out of my head, thankyou for your time