28th April, 2024

Yello friends of the Digital Blog world.

This week we left our quiet little camp at ‘Big Bend’ on the banks of the Murray near Swan Reach, where ‘fish-are-a-jumpin’ and thecotton the bird life was plentiful.

We travelled south-west towards the quaint old riverboat village of Mannum, where in the mid eighteen hundreds and early last century this attractive town would have been humming with the site of Paddle-steamers loading wool and grain, destined for distant shores around the world (or, for the flat-earthers – across the disc 😊) – Mannum, is actually the home of the all Australian Shearer farm machinery company!

The narrow main street of Mannum runs adjacent to the bank of the river, and as we walked up the street, I looked out the back between the shop-fronts and could see where the pioneers had manually dug out the banks of fossil rich limestone to make room for shops and walkways.

As I sit here writing this note on an ‘electronic parchment’, I can hear the bird scaring fog-horn blast across the quiet river, coming from the restored and fully functioning ‘Murray Princess’, which is a modern-day paddle steamer – except now in the early 21^st century, it’s carrying wealthy tourists and choice bottles of red, what a contrast! I really cannot help imagining what the old timers would think if they could only peer into this modern age?

We need to travel across the river to town on a ferry/punt from our river-side camp here, to reach the sunny banks of Mannum. We both admire the beautiful stone buildings in South Australia – they are unique to this part of the country; after parking the bulky caravan at our camp and setting up, we generally cruise around these small country towns seeking out the local vintage architecture!

It’s been a tumultuous week for us since arriving here at Mannum – but that’s a story for Leila to tell.

Greetings from the exhausted Gypsy girl

Hmmm, good of Ian to leave it to me to tell his story. It has been a difficult, trying and scary week. On Monday Ian had a doctor’s appointment for a medical for his heavy vehicle license which he was absolutely panicking about.  I spent all weekend and Monday morning trying to calm him, but to no avail, he was ignoring me. Needless to say his blood pressure was extremely high at the doctors, but the rest of his medical went just fine. Tuesday, we headed for Swan Reach and were going to stay at a free camp there but it was full so we went on to Big Bend. It was a lovely spot right on the banks of the Murray as it sweeps around this huge bend with cliffs on one side and willows and reeds on the other. It was windy and cold there, so Wednesday was spent in the van chilling, not literally lol. Ian pottered around and I wrote ¾ of my second essay. Fortunately, we took the table out of the van a few years ago and it has so much space now for easily living and moving around on days like this. We were going to head just up river to another free camp on Thursday, but Ian decided he wanted to go to Mannum, thank God he made that decision. We set up camp then drove to Mt Pleasant for lunch at one of Ian’s old favourite haunts. That afternoon he did some work inside the van whilst I finished off the essay.  At around 5pm I was on the phone to my girlfriend Athena when Ian came out of the shower, put his track pants on and came around the bed to tell me he had a massive pain in the back of his head, and said he was going to lie down.  I suggested he put a shirt on first so he didn’t get a chill.  He just looked at me with a look of incomprehension in his eyes. I said put a T-shirt on, he asked what that was, I pointed to one for him that had dried on the couch, the van was like a Chinese laundry with washing finishing off drying inside from yesterday, he didn’t know how to put it on. I was like, OMG! Something is seriously wrong and I suspected a stroke. I told Athena I had to go, which she agreed because she could hear everything that was being said.  I got him to do the usual facial movements and checked his mobility and speech, all good, but his short-term memory had vanished. He kept asking the same things over and over and couldn’t remember that he’d asked me. Ian looked lost, he knew something was wrong but didn’t know what, poor darling. I thought I’d lost my Eanie to stroke induced dementia. This was seriously scary! Fortunately, when the going gets tough, I instinctively get practical and don’t panic. I quickly got him dressed, grabbed my bag and shoved everything I could think I might need in it, got his medications and bundled him into the car, all within about five minutes of all this happening. Now, have you ever tried to go somewhere in a hurry and had to take a ferry across the river, well we did, it was torture, it seemed to move at snail’s pace. Anyway, we finally arrived at the Mannum hospital, a very small facility. I said I think my husband has had a stroke, the nurses and the doctor did their assessment and came to the same conclusion. Poor Ian didn’t know what was happening, I just wanted to fall into a crying heap on the floor but had to stay strong so as not to frighten him, it was hard. There was a younger lady there with her son being seen too and heard that we had to be transferred to Royal Adelaide hospital, possibly by air. I was still dressed in my round the caravan clothes and hadn’t had a proper shower for a couple of days and felt grubby. She offered to take me back to the van to get a change of clothes and bring me back, completely out of her way, but there wasn’t enough time, given the ferry crossing. She was so kind; it restores your faith in humanity. Anyway, the decision was made that Ian was ok to be transferred by ambulance. Ian hadn’t lost his amazing sense of humour thankfully, and he had all the nurses, the doctor, the ambo’s and the lady in the next bed in stitches as he was wheeled into the ambulance, typical, warm, funny, Ian which was a blessing. It took an hour and half to get to Adelaide hospital. Ian’s niece, Carolyn, is a paramedic in Adelaide and she met us at triage at the hospital. She picked what was wrong with Ian straight away as the Neurologist was questioning me about the event. A scan confirmed that he had NOT had a stroke, thank God. We spent all night in emergency and the Neurologist confirmed Carolyn’s diagnosis at 5am the next morning. He had what is called a TGA, Transient Global Amnesia, believed to be bought on from stress and high blood pressure. Well, no surprises where that came from then was there.  It is extremely rare, and very few doctors and even less paramedics know about it. So! way to go Carolyn!!! It is a condition that resolves itself and may never return. Ian had regained most of his memory by morning but still couldn’t remember the events of the previous evening and the doctor said it may take weeks for those memories to come back. The condition presents as though the patient has had a stroke, so I got it right as well and got him to help within 20 minutes of it starting which was the right thing to do.

Wonderful Carolyn, who had worked the night shift, finishing at 8am, drove us back to Mannum, an hour and half drive, then had to go home and pack as she was moving house. We are so very very grateful for her help, support, and love throughout the whole thing, she was in contact with me via text from Mannum hospital until the next morning all whilst continuing to work. We were both exhausted and slept for most of the day on Friday, then Ian got into bed at 7.30 pm as snug as a bug in a rug, and slept until 4am without moving once. I had to check a few times during the night to make sure he was still alive.

So that’s Ian’s story, very frightening, but thankfully a positive result. I think it’s a wake-up call to not stress, with what some of us know is coming, its vitally important or he won’t make it. Ian has had some good rest for the past few days and is recovering his vitality including his memories.

It was a difficult week, but we had some great views of the Murray, on the way to Mannum, from the cliffs above, its an amazingly big river that has meandered great distances over time after the inland sea receded and the bottom section of Australia rose up billions of years ago. Its easy to see that the sea was here once, the land is still leaching salt and is still so dry, the only real vegetation is along the river, further on from that, its marginal desert like land.  Although, its amazing what can be resurrected from the ground when irrigation is added, I guess a lot of the nutrients from the old sea floor are still there waiting to be utilised.

Anyway, after our traumatic week, we continue blissfully on our way.

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.

 – Henry David Thoreau.   

Hopefully next week will be better and no more dramas from here on in the trip.

See ya.

21st April, 2024

Namaste dear Spectators, Speculators and those expecting something out of the ordinary!

Here we are in beautiful Clare, where the vineyards meet the road – what a contrast from the ‘end of the world’! and of course, there’s a lot less dust down this way.  

We’ve been here many times holidaying over the years and always enjoyed the beautiful rolling hills and golden stubble adorned by many old stone ruins from the 19^th century settlers. There are sporadic shaded areas cast from the beautiful South Australian gum trees. This part of the world has a wonderful Mediterranean climate; ideal for growing olives, healthy vines and producing excellent wines… fermented just for us 😊 – actually, we drove over here for a few days to check out some of the cabins in local caravan parks for our eldest daughter, Emma; she plans to fly down from coastal Queensland in May for my 175^th birthday! What a treat it’ll be to see her again – she’s our gourmet daughter who appreciates good food and quality wines produced here in SA!

Our ‘Diesel-Tugboat’ needs some new tyres to remain safe, so we are off to the Barossa Valley town of Nuriootpa in the morning to get rid of our unwanted cash! ‘Nurri’ as we called it, is a town close to where I grew up and has a distinct Olde German feel to it!..especially the bakeries😊 I can remember the local old folk from back in the sixties interacting with each other in their mother tongue! Of course, they would all have ‘moved on’ by now I imagine but it was a wonderful time to hear them speaking in the ‘old Deutsch language’ and it was inevitable I suppose, that I managed to absorb some of it and can still remember using socially inappropriate profanities – probably because it was much easier!…memories.

Saturday, we caught up with some long-time agrarian friends, Phil and Mary, who are now retired and living in nearby Angaston (a beautiful Barossa village). They shared the news, views, and old times over a cuppa on the sunny veranda. It’s wonderful camping here in such a cool climate, which is complemented by these beautiful Southern autumn colours of the street trees and endless fields of grapevines, exhibiting their annual show of burnt-yellow and rich rubies…what a display! Autumn feels so natural here in some way, with the experience of very distinct seasons in these southern regions – unlike back home in the subtropics?

The new efficient diesel heater is now getting some early morning use when the van becomes slightly chilly from the occasional north Antarctic breeze! –  It’s so easy to press a button and have instant warm air filling our cabin! We are so grateful and fortunate to be able to traverse this sunburnt country in loungeroom comfort.

Musings from the Gypsy girl

In the early hours of the morning, I found myself contemplating the nature of human kind, and this camp here at Greenoch is a perfect example of human’s ability to coexist in peace and harmony.  Everyone here respects others sites, no one interferes with other people’s space or personal items, they all acknowledge one another and at night we can sleep peacefully without concerns for our safety or property. In the early evening couples take their chairs out onto the oval to catch the last of the sun with wine and beer in hand while kids run around with their dogs playing and magpies trot around scooping up any small morsel that might fall from careless hands. It’s a peaceful scene and extremely relaxing to watch. Once the sun goes down though everyone heads for their vans because it gets instantly cold.

Veronica! You would love this part of the world! Being a chef, as you are, you would be in heaven with all the glorious produce on offer.  We found Barossa Fresh in Nuriootpa which is a supermarket with a difference.  Its not affiliated with any of the big chains and I think it is a cooperative.  Well, it is situated in this massive open space and we walked in at the market end, it reminded me of the food markets in Dijon, France, only more modern.  There are cheeses from all around the world, anything you want, delicatessen goods, gourmet goods, beautiful fresh vegies and fruit, all sorts of breads, fish, and meats. But! You must be wealthy to shop here, the prices are steep, I saw some cheeses that were well over $100 per kg, not that you’d buy that much, but it means a tiny wedge is expensive. The meat was $97 per kg for some cuts, and most were above $50 kg. We both drooled over it all, good thing we aren’t rich, we would be as fat as fools. All this is not to mention the markets at Angaston on Saturday mornings, and the cellar doors for quality wines.  It truly is a foodie and wine lovers paradise.

One other find was the Tanunda Bakery. We went there for lunch while our tyres were fitted, its not in the town centre, its out in the more industrialised/suburban space on the main road to Nuriootpa. The place was packed and there was a constant line out the door.  We found out why, I had the BEST pie I have ever eaten. It was a steak and mushroom pie with a gourmet gravy in it, OMG it was good. We had to make a second visit, but that’s all.  Constraint is the answer.  The food here is too good for our health, well just a small indulgence as we don’t get here too often, Ian gave a porcine squeal and stamped his trotters in frustration, oink, oink.

On Sunday afternoon we went to Gawler to visit Kathryn and David, members of our Billi group who have moved over here.  It was so nice to see them and feel a bit of normalcy in the world. They had only moved into their very beautiful home three days earlier and we interrupted them in their unpacking.  They did know we were coming though and the break from the work was welcome Kathryn said.  They are so excited about their miraculous find, it really is a beautiful home, ready to move in with no work to do, perfect. We had a lovely afternoon catching up on events and Billi news, not that we had much, only what is on our telegram site as they left the Tweed the same time we did.

After leaving Kathryn and David we took a drive to Cockatoo Valley to see the house Ian grew up in on the Barossa Gold fields. It still looks the same. Then a leisurely drive back to the other end of the Barossa in the soft golden light and long shadows of this mid-autumn afternoon.  I love autumn, its my favourite time of the year and I’m revelling in the autumn colour, gorgeous days and soft gentle light.

There aren’t many photos this week because it was really a business kind of week with buying tyres and doctors appointment for Ian and booking accommodation in Clare for when Emma comes down in late May and visiting friends.

If I go missing put my name on wine bottles instead of milk, that way my friends will know to look for me!

So, as we waddle into the sunset, we bid you Auf Weidersehen.

14th April, 2024

Hiya Blogworts,

We left the beautiful river near Morgan earlier in the week, mainly for ‘mudworthy’ reasons 😊 and moved north west to the beautiful bush town of Burra. We parked at the showgrounds close to town for a modest fee and some basic amenities; there were a dozen vans in there each night because, we were informed, the local caravan park was overflowing! There are so many people on the road caravaning nowadays! (some are homeless) and it seems the crippling lockdowns actually had a positive effect on the general populus, especially the retiring Post-War Baby-Boomers?  I think many of the battered souls questioned their hectic lifestyle or simply could not do the Bali jaunts or Euro trips any more.

Burra, or more correctly Burra-Burra is a very picturesque outback town, which had a population of 5,000 in the 1850s. That was back when copper ore was being mined and hauled off to local smelters, before being shipped off to Queen Vick’s England for a very good price. Many of the original stone houses and well-maintained government buildings still stand strong and are in daily use. Pepper trees line many of the narrow streets, with small miner’s cottages down near the creek and the wealthy Toffs living in beautiful mansions up higher – catching the summer breeze on their elevated streets, escaping some of the 47C warmer days!

This lovely town has a special attachment for me, probably because as a child in the fifties, our family would take off on holiday in the old convertible tourer, with a bulging trailer full with canvas tent, equipment, and supplies – enough for my parents, baby sister and raucous brothers! Of course, back then (“buk-in-mah dae”), rabbits were plentiful and bitumen roads were less common in outback South Australia – so we kids would always enjoy the inevitable dust, campfires and the childhood excitement of camping outdoors! usually amongst the mallee, saltbush and gums…and rabbits!.

Wondering around the many sites to see here in Burra we came across some interesting ways of living in the old days.  The Dugouts were fascinating, where the miners dug out homes for themselves and their families in the banks of the creek. The digging occurred after work each day and could house a family of eight in a few room.

Burra was originally a series of small villages, Aberdeen, South Aberdeen, Hampton, Burra Burra plus one or two others (I can’t remember their names).  The Hamptons village was up on the hill and may have been owned by the toffs, but not much remains of it today. You hear the name Nobs and Snobs a lot here, there is even a shop called that, because all the Snobs owned the many big and well built houses on the hill and the Nobs were the people who worked for them.

There are a couple of mines still visible today and made into museums. Bon Accord mine was one of the main ones, and a portion of it still remains today where they produce copper oxide and other chemicals.

The main pit in town is no longer working and has received funding a few years back to restore some of the Cornish houses, with the largest reconstruction in the world on this site.

They had their own gaol here that had a massively long list of inmates names, it was very busy. You could be locked up for insanity, idleness and drunken and disorderly, not to mention other more serious offences. In a mining town you can easily imagine why the gaol was so busy.

Leila and myself had seen the ‘city highlights’ of Burra after three days, so we moved out to a popular camping area on the beautiful burra creek, favoured by countless travellers for many decades. We turned off the highway SE of burra and found the Worlds End Campsite sign! – wow! what an intriguing name? it seems many settlers didn’t count on this harsh arid land collapsing into total drought for years and destroying all their hard work, except for the efforts of building timeless stone homes! These poor unfortunate and very naïve Europeans! – I expect they really would have seen it as the metaphoric ‘end of the world’ and we observed the evidence with plenty of old stone-house ruins on our journey in to the campsite.

Our camp is on a well-maintained gravelled area along the running creek, along with some other ‘oldies’ in self-contained caravans. The beautiful ancient river gums with incredibly wide girths lined our creek and of course was a Mecca for local wildlife and birds from afar! We certainly don’t sleep in around here with the 10,000 cockatoos waking in the big eucalypts overhead at daybreak and circling our van! I imagine this water hole would have enticed some of the innocent settlers to set up their new life around here, because this time of year (autumn) there appears to be abundance…well, almost! If you include the lush saltbush and nutritious sand.

My adventurous bushland brother-in-law Graeme, with his companion dingo-dog Keithy, drove about 700 Kms up from the Wimmera in Northern Victoria in his well-equipped rig yesterday and dropped in for a few days, staying with us here on Burra Creek; Graeme loves travelling around the countryside enjoying the bush and our native animals. Like ourselves, he loves investigating the rich history behind our Australian bush towns. He parked adjacent to our van for company, sharing drinks, stories, and meals. On his first day here, I wanted to show-off my latest project of plaiting a string sling …I was telling him of their antiquity and uses, so then decided to demonstrate how it works! He was intrigued, until I placed a medium sized piece of quartz into the pouch – which we had picked up on our walk and then twirled the sling around my shoulders and released it at great speed towards a tree stump…unfortunately, with my lack of skill and experience, the heavy missile shot into the air above us! and to my horror (and Graeme’s) was heading down out of the sky directly for Graeme’s caravan aluminium rooftop and solar panels, Yikes! Of course, it hit with a thud and bounced onto the dusty track! I couldn’t apologise enough ☹ the dent and small cut it left behind was not good! So, I repaired it for him with the use of silicone sealant and a 10-cent coin. Poor Graeme, he was diplomatic but not impressed – how embarrassing! ……Hmm Remember ‘Murphy’s Law’?  

The weather here in the South Australian Mid North is beginning to cool off now with nights in the single digits and day temperatures in the teens! It’s so refreshing after this years extreme summer, with oppressive sub-tropical heat and appalling humidity along the north pacific coast. Fortunately, I fitted a diesel heater to our spacious van before leaving our home back in Banora Point (in 35ºC heat!) and so now, we can easily warm up the van in the chilly mornings –  it’s simply a matter of pressing a button😊and voila.

Gypsy Girl:

Wednesday, we arrived at Worlds End and found the Garden of Eden! Well, that’s a slight exaggeration but it is extraordinarily beautiful if you love nature as we do. You traverse the vast barren valley south of Burra where the hills and the flats are devoid of trees and then suddenly you encounter a strip of trees that cut across the valley following the creek. We turned off the road and drove towards the hills and found these amazing campsites along the Burra Creek Gorge. The creek is lined and overcast by ancient Murray River red gums, the girth of some would take at least four or five people with their arms outstretched to reach around.  I love the South Australian Gum trees. Its not hard to see why Hans Heysen dedicated the majority of his painting career capturing the majesty of these trees on canvas. The colours of the south Australian landscape are numerous, with earthy ochres, pinks and straw colours dominating.

The bird life is phenomenally abundant. Flocks of galahs cavorting like teenagers in the air, Cockatoos noisily blustering their way through the galahs, Jays flying in waves close to the ground showing off their magnificent wedged tails with a white stripe across. Tree hoppers foraging along the ground for stray seeds and hopping amongst the tree branches, Magpies chortling when a cuppa comes out, and the willy wag tails that follow us everywhere. The trees are alive with sound and movement, the ends of fine branches spiralling to the ground where the birds have chewed through them and this is only mid-afternoon, I can imagine what it will be like in the evening and early morning.  There are kangaroos in the paddock on the opposite side of the creek and you can see where they come down to drink. The old trees are full of holes for nesting birds and possums so I guess it will come alive as night falls.

There were several different parrots flying around, small green one, blue and yellow rosellas, larger colourful but mostly green ones. There were also finches and small birds that had a song like a canary, but obviously not canaries. This is a bird watchers paradise.

The hills behind us have shadows at three in the afternoon that blend with the light on the lower slopes so finely its hard to see where light and shadow meet. Unfortunately, there are flies that are annoying.  I was trying to read this afternoon and I had to get my hat on with my fly netting I made, over the top.  I piled the netting on the brim of the hat until I went outdoors and Ian reckoned, I looked like Aunt Violet from Downton Abbey, I hope he was referring to her regal presence rather than her great age lol.

We leave Worlds End tomorrow but it is a place we will definitely come back to in the future, its just so peaceful and beautiful here.

There is a calmness to a life lived in gratitude, a quiet joy! 

Ralph H. Blum

See ya next week bloggies.

7^th April 2024

Hi Bloggies

The week started off with us still in Barmera at Lake Bonnie over the easter break.  There were loads of people, vans, and tents, it was like a gypsy village. Sorry about my spelling mistakes, I usually type these up quickly and don’t edit, so bear with me, I can spell believe it or not.

We moved to Waikeri on Tuesday and camped at Holder Bend, a nice bush camp on the river. We stayed there for three nights. A paddle steamer dropped off some eager people who set up a settlement here and called it Holder. There are cliffs to the left and reeds and beautiful old gums along the river and lots of bird life.  Ian will tell you about his encounter with one noisy miner.  We explored Waikerie, went on the ferry to see if it would be ok to cross with the caravan and not much else.

On Friday we set off for Morgan and hoping to stay there. It is only 48 kms up the road, so we aren’t going far.  Morgan is an interesting river town with huge river cliffs, historic wharfs, and buildings.  It was a major inland port in its day for distributing goods from other states and from overseas until the railways were introduced to move goods around the country. 

The national parks camps were closed along the river at Morgan so we couldn’t stay there.  We headed back to Cadel on the river flats and ended up finding a great camp on the river called Hogwash Reserve.  As we approached it we thought, great we’ve got the place to ourselves, but as we moved in closer we could see all these vans down on the beach, darn.  We set up back from the river bank a bit and joined in the enjoyment of this wonderful spot. It was magic! 

We were sitting enjoying a cuppa when I caught movement out of the corner of my eye and a sailing boat was coming in to land. It tied up to a tree in front of us.  It wasn’t a sight we expected to see on the Murray this far up. The skipper we nicked named Captain Crete because he looked like Captain Crete of the Durrell’s lol. Nice guy, his name is Gary. He is on his first trip to Waikerie and stopped to have lunch but after meeting us and the strange guy in front of us, he decided he’d stay the night.

Ian finally got his blow-up boat out and took it on its maiden voyage, much to mine and Gary’s amusement.  It was so funny, Ian was trying to row this boat on blow up seats slowly sinking from a sitting position to eventually lying down rowing, I still laugh as I write this.  Gary thanked him for the free entertainment.  Gary had some great knowledge of boats and told Ian he needed to put a ply wood floor in the boat to make it rigid enough to sit on.  Makes sense really, but it was a lot of fun trying to work out how it all worked.

The forecast was for rain on Monday, but it didn’t say if it was overnight Sunday night or during the day on Monday, and given our experience, we erred on the side of caution and left on Sunday after having a really good natter with Captain Crete and the other guy (we never did get his name), who it turns out are on the same page as us with all this bull shite that’s been going on for the past four years.  We are amazed at the amount of awake people out here, it is so heartening to see, Viva Australia!

Sunday we arrived in Burra and camped up at the showgrounds for three nights.  It’s a really interesting place, we’ve driven through it several times but never stopped to have a good look around, so now we are, but that’s a story for next week.

Ian:  

Waikeri/Morgan

Yello Bloggies,,, 

We’ve been a few places since our last logbook entry, one great camp along the Murray is close to the very interesting town of Waikeri. We stayed out of town on the historic settlement of Holder on the bend which has some nineteenth century ruins. It was settled by some keen settlers after being dropped off by a steam driven paddle steamer in 1894! – the poor devils didn’t realise the disastrous extent of flooding every decade or so and subsequently lost the lot except for their efforts at building stone walls which still stand!

I presume that’s why Waikeri is way up the banks out of the flood waters? We stayed for several days being attacked by flies and noisy minors because I was near their nest!…I spoke to some Dutch visitors fresh in from the Adelaide airport travelling in a motorhome headed for the eastern states. They found it incredible that we Ozzie’s have the freedom to just travel around and camp unrestricted and for free along the river! I suppose we are spoilt really …well that is, until the government decides they are not profiting from it!

The stay was cut short by encroaching southern weather and threatening rain, so being camped on a river-flat lined with recent flood and potentially sticky loam (remember the recent sliding efforts on the river mud near Balranald?)

We moved on down the river to Morgan and across the river near Cadel, where we stayed on another dry mud flat camp meeting up with the “Captain Crete” close to the river with his 20-foot yacht! – Anyway, Leila has told you some more river gypsy tales.

A river doesn’t just carry water, it carries life

See you all next week.

31st March, 2024

The Journey Continues

2024 – Five years later – (in a very different world)

Easter…….

Hello blogworthy audience

We have been casually camping along the shores of Lake Bonney at Barmera SA for just over a week. It’s a really beautiful place with lovely (almost clear) fresh mineral water lapping at the sandy beach ten metres away, where abundant birdlife find their breakfast. This lake is fed by the Murray from the western end, which subsequently floods along with the big river.

The atmospheric dust in this arid part of the world can be an issue for some of us with respiratory problems. I shone the torch into the sky last night and noticed the vast number of particulates and small insects floating about – no wonder I’m winning local sneezing competitions! Thinking of the great dusty outback; I tried eating some saltbush leaves yesterday and think it would be a palatable albeit salty survival food, hopefully free of unpleasant alkaloids! Good for when the grocer shop closes it’s doors Haha.

Understandably, there have been many campers along these shores over Easter…presumably from the Adelaide surrounds. It has certainly been enjoyable here over our week-long stay, watching the sociable easter people and kids frolicking with their pets and swimming in the warm waters; although we could have done without the balmy midnight cricket game last night! It’ll be quiet again tonight …except for the clacking of Leila’s typewriter in the background! She has only three units left before the big day at the end of this year.

This shallow lake was ‘discovered’ in 1838 by white fella explorers….but of course used by the Aboriginal people for sustenance and pleasure over untold millennia; what a wonderful life it must have been here? Now of course, the whole area is dominated by grape, citrus and stone fruit growers using the (almost) abundant Murray water….and as for the forgotten tribes of old? We have been speculating why these local indigenous people didn’t build mud huts or indulge in basic agriculture with all these available resources? – or, could it be that it simply wasn’t in their conscious frame of reference? as with ancients of old not visualising the wheel? (I won’t go into Atlantean possibilities of course)

Being seasoned gypsies, we are heading off down this wonderful Murray River on Tuesday, to find a new spot for our camp and stay for a while. See you then.

Rantings from the Gypsie girl.

Ian and I see things quite differently don’t we.

This has been a quiet week for the most part.  There were a few other campers last weekend and early in the week.  Wednesday night it was just us.  It’s been a week for nature mostly.  On Monday night we went up the road then across the paddocks to a slight rise, in the middle of no where with 360 degree views of the flat landscape, to watch the full moon rise and then the eclipse which was forecast to be a partial eclipse here in Barmera.  The official website said it would start at 7.15pm and end 8pm and cover about half the moon.  We arrived at about 7.15 as the moon was rising, it was huge but nothing happening.  At 7.30 still nothing happening so we checked the website that said it was in progress.  We waited until 8pm and there was absolutely nothing, no diminishing of the perfect circle of the full moon.  What was going on?  When we got back, we googled some live feeds, which by now were recordings of the eclipse and we witnessed other sites just videoing the moon and nothing happened for them either. There was one site that had a recording of a full moon eclipse, so we are puzzled, did we slip into another timeline.  The strange thing was no one was talking about it either, nothing on the news (which we only turned on to see what they were saying about it) and people weren’t saying anything. Very strange. Anyway, life goes on.

In the mornings we sit under the awning in the shade facing the lake, if we don’t do anything else.  We were sitting reading the other morning and movement caught my eye and when I looked up there were hundreds of cormorants flying low to the water from one end of the lake to the other with seagulls and a pelican in tow.  All you could hear was the gentle swish swish of their wings, it was a beautiful sight to see.  They were feeding on some schools of something in the lake, when they landed on the water it was like a giant washing machine as they dived for the food.  They followed the school from one end to the other.  What we were amazed at, was how did they know the school was up our end from the other end which is about six kilometres away.

In the evenings, we sit on the eastern side of the van in the shade and have a cold drink and a chat. There is a beautiful tree on that side which is full of colour.  The trunk and large branches are coloured in burnt sienna, potters pink and silver and grey. The small branches are a mixture of alizarin crimson, transparent orange and cadmium yellow towards the leaves.  The leaves are quite small but are in such a profusion they appear as clouds that have settled on the tree, they are varying shades of sap green, lemon yellow and blue/green with tiny flowers of cadmium yellow. Large insects are having a feast on the flowers.

We have made friends with a guy who lives over the road, Trevor and his dog, buddy.  Trevor usually comes and has a yarn with us of an afternoon as he walks buddy.  Buddy is grateful for the shade and sits patiently as Trevor fills us in on the area and his life history.  He had an important position on the Barmera council in his day and has lived in the area all his life, so he is full of information.

Thursday the caravans and campers started rolling in and on Friday there was little room left. It’s a village of caravans, tents, roof tents, marques, chairs, tables, kids and dogs.  What a hive of activity it is.  There are several speed boats hauling people behind on skis and tubes, jet skis and kids on blow up boats, unicorns, paddle boards and kayaks. They are a great bunch of people, everyone getting on and living together harmoniously and respectfully.  There are a lot of young people who are very well behaved, they have their music but its not loud or offensive.  Unfortunately, today, Sunday there are a lot of really loud booming boats going back and forth which is annoying the hell out of Ian, I just ignore them. Some cooler weather rolled in this afternoon, putting on a lovely show of cloud and colour, completely changing the landscape.  We were so grateful for the cool breezes now issuing off the lake.

Our youngest daughter Ashleigh returned safely from her American and Canadian trip on Good Friday, thank God! She had a great time but was shocked by the amount of homeless people and crack heads, as she puts it, in both places.  She wisely didn’t fill me in on a dangerous situation she found herself in in New York, knowing I would freak, but thankfully her intuition is switched on and it alerted her to the danger she was in allowing her to take the right action to remain safe. I’m glad she’s home, I can breathe again. The destiny of a mother is to be forever concerned for her offspring.

I finished re-reading a book I read on our last trip in 2019, Women in Sunlight, by Frances Mayes and I loved it as much the second time around. Anyway, I found this stanza of a poem quoted in it that is quite fitting for the times we are in;

The sense of danger must not disappear:

The way is certainly both short and steep,

However gradual it looks from here;

Look if you like, but you will have to leap.

I’ll leave you with that this week.

24th March 2024

Hello again friends

Monday morning, we headed for Mildura and once there we stocked up on food, drink, and water before heading out to King Billabong free camp. The camp was a thin stretch of land along the Murray with camp spots on the river side of the dirt road.  We found a good one and set up. Great views of the Murray where we sat and watched birds forage for food in the water and house boats drift by.  It was very idyllic. In the late afternoon lots of cars started speeding up and down the dirt road throwing dust everywhere, including inside the van. Tuesday morning Ian said, I think we’ll move to the other free camp on the other side of town, talk about pivot on a pin. We checked the BOM for possible rain, none was forecast for the entire week, sun symbols everywhere. Anyway, we arrived at the other camp and made our way in, we weren’t impressed and it wasn’t exactly the most picturesque place so we decided we’d move on, but we had bought a load of fruit just yesterday thinking we’d be here for at least four or five days, so we had to do something with that.  We parked, then cut and cooked the apples in cinnamon and sugar water and we both ate three bananas, an apple and 500gsms of grapes each (you can’t take these fruits into South Australia), good thing we didn’t have breakfast because as Ian said, we were like two fruit bats on a Friday night. We were only at this spot for about 20 minutes then a couple of drops of rain fell. To be clear, this site was full of clay and was further to the main road than the Balranald stop. So, we quickly packed up the cooking and left. When we emerged from under the trees we looked to the west and there was this massive dark menacing storm about to hit so we got the hell out of there as fast as we could before the rain started in earnest.  The BOM lies! You cannot believe a word they put out.

We arrived at the quarantine checkpoint and the guy says do you have any fruit or vegetables on board and I said yes, I have a fruit salad in my belly which gave him a laugh. We stopped at the tourist information centre in Renmark after crossing the 90-mile desert. Last time we came across here there was just red sand and tumble weed everywhere, this time there is grass, some red sand, and shrubs, its looking quite healthy. The woman at Renmark tourist info said we needed to have our grey water plumbed in to stay at any of the free camps (which we later found out from the council, was incorrect) and so she pointed us to Martins Bend in Berri which was $5 per night, we stayed for four nights which cost us all of $20 buck, cheap at half the price. It was a great camp under some lovely trees.  We made a strong connection with the people parked near us, Gary and Terri, it was as though we had known them all our life, same as Rodney and Melissa at Lake Benanee, but we didn’t connect with other people, just polite conversation.  Somehow, I think we were meant to connect with both couples, because the circumstances of the last week made sure we did.  Well, our intuition is finely tuned and we are both very aware of it, we knew we had to move when the universe said move, and so we did and connected with these lovely people.

Ian wasn’t within eyesight the other evening and I could hear this strange noise and couldn’t work out what it was or where it was coming from, I thought it was him, but it turned out to be a male ringtail possum harassing a female with a little baby on her back.  Gary came out and said he heard it too and didn’t know what it was, so we stood around for a while shining the torch on these little guys talking and discussing possums, I’m not sure they appreciated it.

The trees along the river are majestic, towering high into the sky and home to thousands of swallows who cavorted crazily and we discovered an eagle’s nest high up in one of them.  Unfortunately, I had to put in some serious work for a day and a bit here because I had been neglecting it so far.  Its hard to study when you have this gorgeous environment beckoning you, anyway I got the draft essay written in a day and half, now I will sit on it for a few days and then edit it.

Berri is a nice, very clean town. Very friendly people with a lovely small town feel to it. It’s a nice spot to stay but we had to leave on Saturday because it was booked out.  With Easter looming we needed to secure somewhere because everywhere gets booked out over Easter.  We booked Lake Bonnie in Barmera about 15kms up the road.  What a spot! totally magical right on the lake, its gorgeous with lots of bird life which I’m happy about.  We will be here until 2^nd April, its pretty quiet now but I bet it gets busy next weekend, it seems this is the beach for inland towns, complete with seagulls would you believe.

We took a drive around the lake on Sunday and there seems to be loads of free camps around it, but I think where we are is the nicest. Anyway, we came across these old ruins, they were the Lake Bonnie Hotel ruins from 1839, when two blokes and their families emigrated from the Guernsey Islands and decided to build the hotel when they got jack of farming along the Murray. It’s a harsh environment out here and all you need is a few dry years and life gets pretty tough.  Its hard to imagine genteel English folk coming all the way out here to the antipodes to forge a new life, how disappointing to see this dry baked land after the beautiful lush green hills of England.  Still if they and the Irish didn’t come then I guess we wouldn’t be here doing this would we?

That’s all for this week folks, next week may be quiet too, but you never know in this strange and bizarre world.

“Your self-worth is determined by you”

17th March 2024

Greetings Blogites

Well! here we are again, embarking on another epic journey wandering around this great brown land that we love. It was an epic exercise getting ready, with six weeks, to do repairs, refurbish the lounge in the van and the dinette seats and pack and get the house ready for Jacqueline and Jason who will be living there for the next twelve months.  

It was wonderful to share a farewell dinner with our much-loved Billi Family group on Wednesday night, we are going to miss you all so much, but the universe in its wisdom seems to be scattering quite a few of us to the winds this year. 

Anyway, we left at 8.30am on Saturday 9^th March, it would have been my brother Stephens, 63 birthday that day.  I remember when we did the big trip in 2019 he followed us religiously every week on our blog and when we were late posting he’d ring me and ask what we were doing, why wasn’t the blog up.  He said he lived for it.  He had cancer at the time and it was never going to be something he could have achieved, so he did it vicariously through us.  So, it was fitting that we left on his birthday and I bet he is watching from where ever he is now.

We stopped at Beardy Creek free camp north of Glen Innes which was a shock, it was cold and windy, quite a difference to the hot, humid weather we have been having all summer. Next morning it was a leisurely drive to Bingara where we set up for three nights beside the beautiful Gwyder river free camp. It was nice to wind down and relax a bit. It was so hot here, we plunged ourselves into the river of an afternoon. The first day I hung from the weeping willow fronds as the swift water tried to drag me away. Ian lost his glasses and almost lost his thongs when we had a water fight, sorry darling. The next few days we took our camp chairs down into the water to cool down as the whispering water caressed our legs as it slunk gently and quietly away, it was so soothing and cooling.

In the evenings we sat outside the van and watched the insects play in a patch of weeds, there were dozens of butterflies of various sizes, loads of hover flies, bees, a huge skink, and a willy wag tail that insists on following us everywhere, you watch it will be with us all over Australia.  The horses that graze on the common come to the water to drink every day and what a beautiful sight it is to see them frolic together as they make there way down to the water to drink.  You would love this, Lisa.

Wednesday, we set forth for Dubbo, it was a long hot day and we eventually stopped at Red Earth Winery next to the Dubbo Zoo.  Nothing to write home about really.  Thursday, we headed for West Wylong, a sad town that seems to have been forgotten but we kept going and stopped for the night in Weethalle.  There was one small café open in town. All the other shops were bordered up, including the pub, and the Whistle Stop café at the old railway station which had been functioning since 1989 succumbed to the devastation that the whole plandemic created, the town is all but dead.

Friday we headed for Balranald and we stopped for the night at the Balranald Lower Weir free camp. The road in is four kilometres and is a dry weather road only.  Well it was dry and there was not a chance of rain on the horizon so we went it.  It was a nice enough spot on the banks of the Murrumbidgee. Two other couples arrived and set up their camps.  It was really hot, 30 degrees at 9 pm, and these city slickers from Geelong and Sydney decided to build a fire just outside our van and sat around it. Who does that when its too hot to think.  Idiots! They didn’t extinguish it properly either, we could smell it during the night and strong wind whipped up, thankfully nothing untoward happened.

Balranald Lower Weir, view from our van

Saturday morning rose slowly as overcast clouds blocked the sun.  I thought great I’ll sit outside and do my reading for my essay and get some work done.  It was cold, really cold, I had to get a jumper on. Then there was a loud crack of thunder and lightning, all before 11am.  We were having a cuppa when it started to rain.  We could not get the BOM to come up on the phone the night before due to poor coverage but we tried again and it said only 2ml to day but 8 ml tomorrow.  Hmmm, maybe we should pack up and leave asap. I think we packed down the van in about 15minutes and started heading back up the four-kilometer dirt track. The road was slippery as hell, we hit a large stretch of clay that was beyond imagining. The car was going in one direction and the van in another, fish tailing wildly. Ian stopped in the middle because it was all getting out of control.  So, there we were in the middle of this super slick slipper clay road trying to decide how to tackle it all. The car was in 4 wheel drive which wasn’t much help. The rain started to get heavier from the storm so we had to make a move, so off we went again, in ten wheel drive, the van went crazy. It was sliding all over the place and was heading for the gutter. I have to say Ian validated his hero status once again the way he fought the car and van, weaving backwards and forwards constantly to keep the whole rig in the middle of the road. I was rubbing his back encouraging him, telling he could do it, whilst watching the van dance wildly in the rearview mirror.  Ian told me to breath because I had forgotten, breath girl, breath he said, its going to be alright. I prayed to the universe to get us through this safely, and kept telling myself I’m not in fear, everything will be ok, then we saw the Sturt Highway, what a relief, we made it. I think the universe has been testing us this week because a few small things have gone awry and we have had to work out ways to fix it. It took a bit to relax after that.

We have eventually stopped at Lake Benanee, which is a free camp as well. What a contrast, so beautiful and peaceful right next to the water. We went for a swim this afternoon as our bath for the evening and washed our hair.  Don’t worry, it was a natural shampoo so doesn’t pollute. All underwear was left in the van and we went in shorts and t-shirts only, now this was a real wet T-shirt winner, Corina, lol. I’m sitting by this beautiful lake now as I type this, watching the sweet swallows dart and dive for insects, the peaceful doves nod their way along the water’s edge, and the willy wags showing off. Thank you, universe, for the peace and beauty after the traumatic events of this morning.

He’s at it again!

Anyway Bloggies, that’s the lot for this week, see you next week.

Greetings for the last time Blogites

The journey home was gruelling, all we wanted to do was sink into bed at home, but we had to get there first!

The drive from Nyngan saw us move through an ever-increasing damp landscape that was practically bouncing for joy.  Driving into Coonabarabran the hills and paddocks were pure exposed dirt.  It was bad when we went through early last year, but at least there was dead grass on the ground, now there was nothing! just dirt right up into the hills and ranges.  It was a dark colour after the rain and hopefully it will come back to life quickly.  Things improved the closer we got to Coonabarabran, which was a heart-warming sight.

There was a lot of water on the sides of the road and whole paddocks full around Tamworth.  You could see where the floods had cut the roads just a day before.  How wonderful to be talking about flood now instead of bushfires.

We emptied our Van water tanks and our 100 L in water containers that we carried across the Nullarbor to divest the rig of excess weight.  It made a huge difference with less drag in the wind and much better fuel economy.

Monday night we stayed in Glen Innis and then took off heading for sweet sweet home.  The New England region that was also in dire straits when we went through last year, had dams full and paddocks blanketed in green – beautiful!  Around Tenterfield the creeks were flowing and lakes and dams were full, and it was fantastic to see the town water supply was full and overflowing that only a few weeks ago was dry and they were literally carting water into the town.

We stopped in Stanthorpe and bought a box of apples again to be turned into chutneys and Worcestershire sauce etc. like I did a couple of years ago.  They haven’t received as much rain as other places and are still buying water in.  They are hopeful they will receive a good amount of the rain, forecast for this week. We arrived home at about 3.30pm and were greeted by our lovely Jacqueline.  Louie the cat didn’t know us at first but as evening came down and his stomach started rumbling, he soon went up to Ian asking for food and titbits.  Jacqueline said he never did that to either her or Jason, so he certainly remembers who we are now that his stomach has spoken.  He spent the whole night sleeping next to me and waking me at various intervals seeing if he could get some more food at all hours of the night, little blighter.

When we walked into the house both Ian and I said we didn’t remember the house being so big and the kitchen – It was huge.  Living in a confined space reduces your expectations and you realise that you can live on very little, we really don’t need all the stuff we think we need.  We were totally self-contained and left a very light footprint in many places (diesel is light, isn’t it?) and even collecting water from the awning to have a hot tub one night on the central west coast of WA.

We had a wonderful journey seeing this beautiful country of ours.  Everyday there was something of beauty to see and so many awe-inspiring landscapes. 

We met loads of people along the way and made some friends, we had lots of laughs and drove some exhausting distances, but it all goes in to creating the most incredible tapestry of memories.

My favourite places were the Kimberley and the great forests of the south of Western Australia.  The ancient land formations of the Kimberly were awe inspiring and the giant forests evokes a peace and tranquillity from another time and place.

We learnt not to follow other people’s opinions of places because often their opinion was the total opposite of ours.  We would have missed some wonderful locations if we had listened to others and we found places that were raved about, as not so special at all.

People inject their own fears into their opinions and the dreams of past experiences into the places that they like the best.  We would be the same I expect, what we like others wouldn’t.  It also depends on what your expectations are and what it is you are wanting to get out of the experience.  We revelled in nature in all its forms and weren’t that fussed about man made sites except aboriginal sites.

We weren’t into shopping or souvenir hunting; we created our own souvenirs with our paintings.  I did however collect some rocks, shells and feathers along the way, but these are all nature’s bounty.  I took a rock from Coober Pedy close to the Aboriginal sites, but not from the site itself and it worried me for a while.  I asked Ian one day if I will be cursed by taking the stone and before he could say too much I received my answer myself which was, “Do you really think the spirits of the land would curse you for taking a rock, and want to selfishly keep it all to itself, spirit is bigger than that and is not concerned with such things”.  I did however respect the wishes of the Aborigines and never took anything from their sacred sites.

It pleased me to see the closure of climbing Uluru to tourists.  Uluru is a very sacred place; you can feel it and it should be respected.  We saw people climbing the rock and it didn’t feel right at all, there are places on this earth where respect and reverence need to be maintained, because the earth is a living breathing entity with a spirit of its own.

We listened to our intuition on this journey which resulted in us staying put at times, avoiding certain places or experiences and spontaneously visiting places that we hadn’t planned to visit at the time we did and it kept us safe and in good stead.  If you ever embark on a journey like this my greatest piece of guidance would be to listen to your intuition, your gut feelings, your inner voice speaking, that way you will enjoy a journey of joy and wonder, in safety and with good timing.

Ian is a wonderful partner with whom to share such a journey, we had great times together laughing and fooling about, enjoying the bounty of nature together and we have similar interests.  We didn’t have any great arguments, perhaps a bit testy when we were tired occasionally, but quickly bounced back to our happy selves.  We get along incredibly well, which is important when you are with someone everyday every hour.

Would I do the whole thing again?  YES! I would, but I’d spend more time in the Kimberly region and I’d love to take the road to Western Australia that passes Uluru and Kata Juta.  It goes way out into the desert past other equally impressive land formations, what an adventure it would be.

Ian:

Home after a wonderful experience in our massive country! I found it hard to comprehend the vast distances between towns in WA.; If you ever feel the need for solace or quiet peace of mind, then I suggest an overland trip through Western Australia…and NT if you don’t mind Crocs in your bathwater😊 although I suppose a nibble here and there won’t hurt you? I must remark on the empty space in my life where our little Chester once resided; I had never realised the special bond we had, or how important he was to me – until he left his tortured little body and moved through the etheric veil into the doggy dimension! The house is strangely quiet without him, and so now I have only Louie to give my food scraps to. We are going to ceremonially bury Chester’s ashes in the garden soon, now that we’re home and we can have the girls present.

Unfortunately, Leila has had quite a few ‘sickies’ on our trip! With too many hospital visits….. possibly because of her fondness for hospital gruel? It would seem that when many people retire from a stressful job and move into an easier lifestyle; it’s around then that most of the body parts start to malfunction, drop off or fall apart! Maybe we have a subconscious compulsion to hold it all together and only because we have to, in order to survive, feed the family or pay the mortgage…surely there must be a better way?

In our travels, I found our ‘rig’ to be quite adequate for sustaining a comfortable lifestyle; the manufacturers of Australian Caravans have certainly researched and honed down all the essential needs of long-term travellers. We had all the mod-cons needed to make our caravan home for 12 months. The GM Colorado was very reliable (that’s probably because it was built in Thailand!) and it had plenty of engine power and braking ability as needed when towing a heavy 7 metre Caravan in extreme conditions. As Leila alluded to; our essential dodging of animals and reptiles at speed – which is in itself a tad precarious! But fortunately, we have usually been in a good situation which allowed us to avoid anything too dangerous. I found the (ESC) stability control on both caravan and truck to be of great benefit, when manoeuvring around road wanderers or slippery conditions! I am quite sure from previous driving experience and a slow human reflex, I could never have responded to the treacherous conditions as rapidly and adeptly as the ESC with it’s nano second response time. What a wonderful invention and clever use of electronics.

To all our wonderful friends and family out there in Blog-cyberworld, we thank you for participating in this exciting and wonderful trip we’ve taken over the last 12 months or so. This blog was originally designed primarily for us to keep a record of our adventures and perhaps to share it with a few friends…but it has grown to become an exciting 106,000 words 1,327 page adventure, for a large number of friends and family! – including an online commercial travel company and book publisher, sharing our travelogue and Australian escapades.   

Thank you to everyone who subscribed, commented and enjoyed our travel blog.

Love from Leila and Ian

Banora Point

February 2020

 “Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind.” – Anthony Bourdain

Warning Bloggies!  this is a long one!

We set off from Jane Brook near Perth on Monday morning at 8 am, to start our epic journey home, across the Nullarbor and heading due east into a 35Km easterly.  I fed Taffy for the last time and said goodbye to her, we then said goodbye to Deb and Peter and of course Mister Bastion.

We drove for seven hours straight to Coolgardie 500kms away.  It was a bit of an unexciting drive through wheat fields and progressively less arable land.

It was interesting to see the changes in gum trees as we went and the magnificent jewel colours of the trunks.  There were golds, bronze, silver, lime green and burnt sienna colours with leaves that sparkled in the sunlight.

We thought we’d stay in a caravan park in Coolgardie but the first one we sighted was so hillbilly there was no way we were going to stay there.  The second one in town was better but there was no one in reception and the number they gave rang out, I left a message and it was a couple of hours later that he got back to me.  Pretty poor way to run a business!  There was a free camp at the Railway museum grounds so we decided to stay there.

It was hot hot hot, and we decided we’d like a beer.  The only problem was we had none and we didn’t want to unhitch the car from the van, so we had to walk.  On the way we had a look at the old railway station and the steam train that was waiting at the platform, we then walked a block to the pub. I was outside taking photo’s when Ian went in to order us both a pint of beer.  Bloody hell, we had a huge glass mug filled to the brim with beer, it took some drinking.  The pub was called the Denver City Hotel (perhaps a successful American miner?) we didn’t find out how it got that name.  It was a really quaint old hotel that requires a bit of maintenance, the old floor boards were missing in places and they squeaked and moved as you walked on them.  There was only one other person in the pub when we were there, the poor barmaid was run off her feet.

The main street in Coolgardie was so wide that you could drive ten bullock carts side by side down the road and there would still be room to pass them.  There were a number of old and grand buildings lining the road with dates and titles from times long gone into the past.  It was clear that the town prospered in the days of the gold rush but now it’s very quiet.  It’s a quaint and tidy little town, the old convent down the block is now used as a school for Aboriginal Parent Directed education? just what that entails I’m not sure but they have a lovely grand building to conduct it in.

They mine gold and Nickel at Coolgardie and the mines come right up to the town.  We had wanted to go to Kalgoorlie, which is only 39 kms out of our way on the way home, but because we have to get home as soon as possible, we had to bypass it.

Tuesday morning, we rose early and were on the road at 6.50 am in an attempt to get ahead of the heat.  We drove for 10 hours and covered 700 kms. Stopping every two hours and walking around as I was told I must do; the same as yesterday.  The trip from Coolgardie to Norseman was again pretty uneventful thankfully.  We passed Lake Cowan which is a massive Salt Lake in summer but I’m sure it fills with water in winter.  There was some water in it out in the distance, but then again it could have just been a mirage.

We turned onto the Eyre Highway at Norseman and started heading east again across the great Nullarbor.  We were driving along peacefully with no one else on the road, Ian had looked in the rear-view mirror when I spied a goanna crossing right in front of us, I alerted him but it startled him and he braked and swerved at the same time. God, I thought we were a goner as the car swung over into the righthand lane, so did the huge caravan following! and you could feel it swing out behind us.  It might be my imagination but the car was being pulled and slightly tilting to the right at which point I thought it was all over for us.  But! Thank god we had the foresight to put an Electronic Stability Control system on the van before leaving home, and of course there was a hero at the wheel of the car! who knew what he was doing.  Ian wrestled with the 5-ton rig and managed to pull the whole thing back into alignment and we then continued on our way, with less rubber on the tyres…almost unphased! Doctor’s orders for me were not be stressed in any way, well that worked out well didn’t it, I got a massive dump of adrenaline which sent my heart pounding madly in my chest but thankfully with some water and long deep breaths I was able to avoid any nasty surprises.  I’m sure Ian’s heart was pounding too but he didn’t say anything.

So onward we went enjoying the scenery around us.  We stopped for lunch at Balladonia (it consisted of a petrol station and a motel).  Not long after lunch as we were cruising down the highway, we saw an eagle feasting on roadkill directly in front of us.  Ian honked the horn many times but it wouldn’t budge.  We were doing 100kms an hour and were closing in fast but still it wouldn’t budge, so Ian tried to go around it but the poor bird made a very bad judgement call and took off too late and flew directly in front of the car.  The heavy bird impacted with us at 100km/hr; slammed into the bull bar with a sickening thud and bounced across the bonnet breaking the 2way radio aerial in the process and then rolled off on to the side of the road.  The poor thing would have been dead as soon as it impacted us.  We were both rattled by the incident and sad that we had killed such a beautiful majestic bird.  We had already decided that we weren’t going to swerve again and if we hit a camel, I was to either duck down or move as close to the door as quickly as possible.  All Ian would be able to do is get close to the door.  Anyway, that didn’t happen thank goodness. 

As we drove, we seemed to be going constantly upwards very slowly and there were more trees than we thought we’d see.  We were commenting that the landscape is different to what we thought it would be, but when we drove down through the 200 ft Madura Pass;  spread out before us was the most amazingly magnificent vista, we had been on a plateau and here we had to descend onto the Nullarbor proper.  It was spectacular, vast miles of dead flat land with low level bushes dotted with the occasional tree.  The escarpment then travelled along to the north for countless kilometres.  It was obviously the edge of Australia at one stage, because the high cliffs are made of sand stone and you can see where the ocean may have once lapped up against it.  The Nullarbor may have been part of the shallow seas that covered a large part of Australia and this area was particularly low.  This part of Australia once tipped down into the ocean and movements in the earth millions of years ago thrust it upwards to where it is today, maybe afterwards the shallow seas receded.

We made camp at Moodini Bluff for the night after passing many free camps with no one in them.  We spied a car load of dodgy up to no good people near one spot we thought we might camp at, but intuition told us we should keep going.  Anyway, Moodini Bluff was a great camp with lots of other vans already there when we pulled in at 5.30pm.  Because of the tiring 35kmh ESE headwind we had used a hell of a lot of fuel already with a long distance to the next fuel stop where it’s a mere $1.95 per litre, cheap at half the price! Of course we carried a 40 litre fuel supply in jerry cans.

 Wednesday, we left camp again at 6.45am (mid-west WA time) and drove along the lower edge of the E/W escarpment.  When we reached Eucla, the road went back up onto the escarpment and you could see the ocean far in the distance.  The real Nullarbor was up here on the plateau.  One metre high shrubs for as far as you can see in all directions across a flat vastness lost in time and space.

We crossed the border into South Australia without any fanfare which was disappointing.  The phone changed its time and we got so confused for a while with the differing times on the phones and in the car.  It didn’t make sense, but we have lost two and half hours.  We may be driving into the late evening today before we camp.

We stopped off at a couple of lookouts to view the Great Australian Bight.  At lookout number 1 we could look back at Western Australia and its slopes down to the sea with flat areas of sand and tufty grass before meeting the ocean waves.  

Lookout number two gave views of the bight where the cliffs plunge straight into the sea.  We were lucky to see it with the sun hitting the cliffs at just the right angle to give light and shadow and the sparkling azure waters.  It was stunning.

At the lookouts and as we have been driving along, we have encountered the biggest wasps we have ever seen, they are the size of a small bird.  One buzzed around us at the lookout and its wings are a lovely reddish bronze colour which looks like a hang glider with a big fat body!  I don’t think anyone has told it that the dinosaur’s died out years ago.

We stopped at the Nullarbor roadhouse to refuel, fortunately we didn’t need a full tank, at the extortionate cost is $2.05 per litre.  The landscape around here for as far as you can see in any direction is flat and covered with small 30-centimetre-tall salt bush shrubs with a lot of grey grassy tufts interspersed with desert sands.  You can see traffic coming from many miles ahead.  There’s not even one tree to be seen.  The down side of all of this is there is nothing to break the wind as it howls across the plains at unbelievable force, causing the overweight Colorado to suck diesel like there’s no tomorrow!

We spent the night at Penong, a town known for its windmills.  They had every type of windmill you could think of and the claim of the largest windmill in Australia.

Thursday, we left early again, well we think it was early – the change of time was very confusing; there is a mid-section of the Nullarbor where a generally unknown time-zone is 45 minutes ahead of WA time – possibly because of the vast distance across the state?? Which needs to be taken into calculation when hitting the SA border!

We stopped in Ceduna for morning tea then kept going across the top of the Eyre Peninsula.  It was a very dull trip with field upon field of harvested wheat stubble.  I slept for a bit of it but poor Ian had to soldier on with the driving.  It was hot today and the wind was not on our side, the engine and transmission were getting quite hot, so we stopped at Kimba (the painted silo town) and parked under some trees; went into the caravan, and had a deep sleep for an hour. One of the luxuries of a caravan is that you can just pull up and have a sleep, a meal or go to the loo, anywhere, anytime.

We passed Iron Knob on the way to Port Augusta, a massive iron mine that has slowly been removing a mountain since before World War11, it was huge.  The iron from here goes down to Whyalla or Port Pirie where it is smelted and extruded into all sorts of iron bits – well it used to, so I’m not sure if the smelters are still working there.

We arrived in Port Augusta at 6.05pm and the reception to the caravan park closed at 6pm.  They wouldn’t open the door when I was there trying to work out what to do, but Ian, being his persistent self and not caring what anyone thinks of him, stubbornly stood there with both hands cupped looking through the window at their defiant little faces until they conceded! and opened the door. The crazy (but effective) man.

Friday was an interesting drive across the southern end of the Flinders Ranges and out onto the desert towards Broken Hill. 

We refuelled at Orroroo and whilst Ian was doing that, I went for a walk along the main street taking photos.  I stood in the middle of an intersection taking photos and not one car came along.  This place was so quiet, and still exists in the past.  They have kept the really old buildings of yesterday and still use them, you would swear you had stepped back in time, it was really charming.  I’d would have loved to have had more time to explore this town; when we come back through here one winter/spring to paint the Flinders Ranges, we will do just that.

Peterborough was another interesting south Australian town.  The main street is a strip of shops about one kilometre long.  There was a great little shop that sold old and antique crockery and other household items and they were really cheap.  They had a beautiful Art-Deco silver tea service for $45, although Ian thought it wasn’t solid silver, just brass with electroplated silver (EPNS), because of the pristine condition, it would have been worth a fortune if you sold it elsewhere; we walked away with nothing ☹.

Onward we travelled, into the heart of this arid land with the ground becoming sandier with trees disappearing and the land becoming flatter. We stopped in a little ‘town’ called Olary (beautiful Olary with green pastures and flower lined streams flowing over mossy rocks… (whoops, sorry I was day dreaming), actually It was the classic run down bush town consisting of a pub, a bakery that had burnt down and funny little square weatherboard houses – the whole place felt tired and totally defeated.  Some great painting material though.

Cockburn consisted of about 5 petrol stations and a police station that had security screens on all its windows, that tells you a lot about the place.

The desert between Cockburn and Broken Hill was appalling.  There was very little vegetation and no trees.  The ground was stony with red sand.  There were loads of Willie-Willies dancing across the landscape.  It was fascinating watching them develop and dissipate.

We were checking out the clouds as we drove through the desert, they had beautiful lovely crisp white cumulus tops with a gorgeous pink bottom, which was reflecting back the bright red desert sands.

Ian’s Woods’ family has a lot of history in Broken Hill and he was looking for his grandparent’s house as we drove in, we think we found it, but will go back tomorrow for another look without the caravan in tow. 

There is an interesting massive mine just on the edge of town, so we decided to stay two nights here to look around as we are both getting quite fatigued from all the driving.  All I do is sit in the passenger seat and enjoy the view, but I have been getting very tired not long after lunch and get progressively more tired by the time we stop, poor me lol….time for another ‘nanny nap’.  Ian has been amazing having lots of energy and wanting to keep travelling into the desert.  I have had to force him to stop and when we do, he collapses in a heap.  Needless to say, we have been having some very early nights.

We set up camp at the ‘Lakeside’ caravan park, but there is no actual lake, well there used to be but it hasn’t had water in it for as long as the girl at reception could remember.   We both had a sleep this afternoon and I woke up feeling like we were about to endure a big storm.  I went outside, only to discover that a massive dust storm was heading straight for us, it was blowing a hell of a gale.  Eventually the storm did arrive and delivered some welcome rain and dust, but there is now a lot of red mud covering the van!  The sky was amazing as the storm descended on us; it was a peach colour with all the dust.  The last thing we expected to experience in Broken Hill was a rain storm.  They have received a lot of rain out this way in the past couple of weeks, there is water filling dams and some of the creeks are running, one was full and I think the water has come down from way up north somewhere.  It doesn’t seem to matter how much rain falls it doesn’t change the landscape like it does elsewhere, grass doesn’t seem to grow. The seeds have probably been blown away long ago.

Saturday morning, we were up early and drove out to Silverton.  It’s the place they filmed Mad Max and Mad Max II.  It’s only a small place with a few inhabited houses.  The popular Silverton Hotel was there with a car from the Mad Max movies outside.  We walked around the town (village more like it) which probably has a population of about 50 but there are two churches, one catholic and one Anglican and both still being used by the looks of them.  That’s a lot of church for a small population.

Donkeys roam around freely, possibly left over from the days of gold mining I suspect.  There are signs everywhere asking not to feed them.  Also, there are a lot of empty buildings that have been tidied up for the tourists.  I guess it was a bustling place back in its heyday.

The creeks had water in them today and the river was still running from the storm that came through last night.  We took some pictures of the creeks that might make some nice paintings, both in oils and watercolour, Ian is even thinking of lowering himself from portraiture to paint a landscape, using the sand and trees in the reflective creek-water.

On return to Broken Hill we visited the Pro Hart gallery.  They have his Rolls Royce’s and Bentley cars there, even the 1970’s Rolls that he painted.  The gallery has a huge collection of the Pro’s work along with some from his private collection of European artists, including a painting from the Rembrandt’s school.  This means that the artists who assisted him in order to learn the craft did paintings of their own and Rembrandts style is very much instantly recognisable.

Pro Hart also did sculpture, which we weren’t aware of.  They aren’t particularly good but interesting to look at.  Pro did in excess of 100,000 paintings in his life and they still sell like hot cakes.  His kids would be very wealth and will continue to be wealthy because they only put up a few for sale at a time and large ones are selling for $25,000 and more.  His techniques aren’t particularly good, but he created a style that tells a story and resonates with people.  Or maybe they sell because of the good investment value.  I liked his abstract flower paintings and I’m not a big fan of abstract painting.  You can see he was influenced by the likes of Picasso and Rembrandt and he also dabbled in the cubist style and pointillism.

We found the house the Ian’s grandparents lived in on Williams Street and went in search of their first abode on Chapel Lane, but we didn’t know the number so it was a fruitless search – we soon gave up.

We took a walk along the main street to view the old buildings still in ‘good nick’. The Police have a really old building that they still use and which still has the Queens emblems on the front of it.

We took a walk through the famous Palace Hotel which featured in the movie “Priscilla Queen of the Desert”.  The walls have murals on them that could be mistaken for wall paper but we were told they are all hand painted originals including a Venus de Milo (almost original) 😊on the ceiling three stories up.  The artist would have received a very sore neck painting that or laying on their back.  You wouldn’t want to be scared of heights, because if he fell that would have been the end of him….. and the painting. 

The hotel also boasts the longest balcony in the southern hemisphere! although I think they were having themselves on because we saw another old pub with a longer balcony, can’t remember where, but one of those out of the way places.  It is pretty long and gives a good view of the main mine sight right down in town.

After lunch we visited the Broken Hill Regional Gallery which is housed and an old building that was used to sell hardware and maybe software? in the olden days.  There were some exhibitions on downstairs that we weren’t much interested in but upstairs were works from their collection.  

The galley was bequeathed three beautiful paintings from George McCulloch, who earnt his fortune down the mines.  There is one massive painting and its about 2.5 metres wide, titled “Vae Victus! The Sack of Morocco by the Almoades, Woe to the Vanquished” by Arthur Hacker (who paints in a very similar style to Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema), this painting is valued over $1M dollars.  It is stunning in real life with beautiful light and colour but reproductions of it are a lot darker and duller.  The painting was restored a few years ago which has returned it to its original lightness. 

I asked in the gallery shop if they had a print of it and the guy said we used to have one, I’ll go and have a look for you.  He came back with a lovely print and a card of another painting I liked, I asked how much for the print and he said you can have it for a gold coin donation, then he just gave me the card for free.  Ian reckons he had taken a liking to me (which I didn’t notice), because he deferred to me and was running around doing his best to impress me and then gave me the works for a song.  Fancy that at my age, he was about the same age also, but I don’t think he was interested in an old girl like me.

Sunday dawned with drizzly rain, a welcome sight in these parts.  We left at 8.30 for the gruelling trip to Nyngan.  There were huge amounts of dead kangaroos and other wildlife on the road and goats galore roaming the sides of the road. The weather gradually deteriorated the further east we went, by the time we reached Wilcannia it started with misty rain then became rain proper on the way to Cobar.  There was a lot of water beside the road just before Cobar and numerous places after Cobar, where it was running across the road, but only about an inch of water so it was safe.

It was so nice to see the land out here get a good soaking; the drought affected land had lost a lot of its grass.

The landscape at Broken Hill was rocks, bare ground and sand, then turned to small salt bushes as we moved towards Cobar. Small trees started to appear with tufts of dead grass as we progressed.  After passing through Cobar, the trees became taller and the fields used more for sheep production.  It’s interesting watching the landscape change as we cross this wide country.

No rainbow comes without rain,

No shadow comes without light,

No tear comes without pain,

No effort comes without trying,

Everything happens for a reason,

Just wait and you’ll see.

Morning Bloggies

This has been a week of rest mostly although we did have one lovely day out.

Monday was as hot as hell and it gets the hottest in the late afternoon evening.  We were finishing dinner when the power went out.  We moved outside to see if it was a bit cooler but alas, it wasn’t.  We had to go to bed in the heat with no air con or fan.  Poor Baz did himself out running and barking when we went outside and wouldn’t come to us when we called, so he suffered greatly.  When he did decide to come back in, he panted for hours.  I got up and poured some cold water on him in an attempt to cool him down but to no avail.  He drank copious amounts of water and then when we did go to sleep, he vomited all over the rug and the floor.  Poor guy, the heat really knocks him around.  Needless to say, we had to take the rug outside the next day and hose it down, not a pleasant task.

Wednesday was our day out.  We got up early and drove to Toodyay about 40 kms out in the Swan Valley.  We were told it was a pretty quaint little place and it lived up to its reputation.  There are still a lot of old buildings in the main street but on this Wednesday, there were plenty of cars to see but not many people.

There is a Christmas shop in Toodyay which claims to be the largest Christmas shop in Australia (I think) but its only open from April till Christmas Eve.  It was nice to look through the windows though.  It is pretty big; it took up a whole building.  It’s a shame it was closed I could have bought another bauble for our Christmas tree to go with the others I purchased from the Canberra Christmas shop many years ago.

We returned to Perth to meet up with Mick and Micky for lunch.  We met in the car park at the beach where Mick surfs.  It was a lovely spot with great views up and down the coast and out to Rottnest Island.  There are reefs under the water where Mick surfs and he said its not a good day if he doesn’t come home with some cuts or scratches on himself.  He’s a brave man surfing out there with the white pointer sharks.

We went to Hillary’s Boat Harbour for lunch.  What a place, its been developed for tourists and families.  It’s great, there is a beach where you can swim, shops, restaurants and the actual boat harbour where hundred of yachts are moored.  There would have been countless millions of dollars tied up with those yachts.

We all indulged in fish and chips and spent a very pleasant couple of hours chatting away.  I got sunburnt for the first time on this trip.  Ian would say differently but it’s the first time I actually went red, usually I just go brown.  This trip has been the first time Ian has seen me with a suntan, he says I look different without my peaches and cream skin.    

Well it was sad to say goodbye to Mick and Mickey, we have had a great time with this lovely couple, thanks guys. 

We clocked up one year on the road on Tuesday of this week, hard to believe its been a year, so much has happened. We have been in Western Australia for eight months.  We crossed the Northern Territory/Western Australia border early last June.  We’ve seen a lot of WA in that time, it truly is a magnificent and massive state.

We head for home tomorrow and it will be a quick trip straight home unfortunately.  I was looking forward to visiting a number of places in South Australia and Victoria and visiting relatives, but orders are to get me home as quickly as possible, so we may have only two post of the trip left.  We reckon it will take us about two weeks to get home, maybe a little less.

The next leg of the journey is the epic trip across the Nullarbor, that should be interesting, so stay tuned.

Until next week, from somewhere in the great outdoors.

“The only source of knowledge is experience” – Socrates