Coffin Bay to Streaky Bay

20th to 27th March
Whilst still on the Coast we dove into the local produce, with a long seafood lunch at Coffin Bay, including the iconic oysters, the views over the oyster leases were a great backdrop.

Coffin Bay lunch

We camped in the national park, bayside out of the wind, though we did a few walks beach side... plenty of breeze and white sand there.

Whilst Coffin Bay is a very small village, with only a couple  of streets, it’stheiroysters that put them on the  map.
The water and food source in the bay is ideal for quickly growing oysters, though they now farm the pacific oyster rather than the local oyster whose stock were depleted in years gone by.

Streaky Bay Jetty 

As a contrast Streaky Bay was a bigger village, very neat and plenty of good food and wine. Kevin tried fishing for squid with some locals, but no luck, so we settled for seafood in the pub.

Powerhouse museum 

The town has an impressive powerhouse museum with over 460 working engines.... local enthusiasts even started the old chaff cutters, motors and water pumps up for us.

We were lucky enough to be invited to a BBQ with some locals we met at Speed Week, a fun night and great to make new friends in interesting places.

 

The Eyre Peninsula

7th to 20th March
We’re now heading along the coast line for the next few weeks, first stop Whyalla. Its still a working port shipping out Iron Ore, with mining a huge employer in the area.

HMAS WHyalla

Up until the mid 1970’s there was a thriving ship building industry in Whyalla. HMAS Whyalla was the first mine sweeper build for the Navy for WW2, now back on display in an impressive maritime museum.
We’ve plenty of power with 2 solar panels to run our fridges and LED lights, but every 10 days or so we head to a caravan park to do the washing and take advantage of a long hot shower.


The beaches along the peninsula are white sand, blue seas and clear water. Despite it being March the water temp is around 19C, and mostly we have the beaches to ourselves. We spent 5 days Camping and hiking in Lincoln National park, before heading into Port Lincoln township for the cage diving with sharks.... luckily we both came back from that day.

September beach

Our first stay in Lincoln National park we camped at September Beach, then after a weekend in town we camped at Surfleet cove.
We did several 4 to 10km bush walks over the forntinght, a great way to see the bird life, wrens, lincoln ring necked parrots and silver eyes, ..... and scenery though it’s mainly heath and mallie country.

This part of the coastline is know as the seafood frontier, we’ve seen plenty of fish cage farming, oyster leases, eaten the king George whiting, coffin bay oysters and crabs.

Fresh caught and cooked crab.  

Sunset over the bay

Next stop Coffin Bay for some oysters straight off the leases..

Iron Knob and Speed Week

1st to 6th March 2019
The coastal fringe is now behind us, and we’re heading towards Lake Gairdner for some salt lake fun.

Sunset at spears creek

We met our travel buddies Graham and Wendy at Spears Creek campsite, a working sheep station where we overnighted before heading to Iron Knob.

Iron Knob is a mining town that supplies iron ore to Whyalla Onesteel (formerly BHP). The heat wave had the temp at 43C, so we stayed at the pub that night rather than camping. We spent the day at the bar, and in the publicans swimming pool, trying to cool off.

Kev and Graham poolside

The annual DLRA (Dry Lake Racing Australia) event is held on the Lake Gairdner salt pan, 160km long and 40km wide. The event sees motor cycles, trucks, cars, custom vehicles and historic’s complete for race times.
Vehicles hitting speeds of over 200 miles per hr where not uncommon.

DLRA marshalling grid 

Before going onto the salt each day we had to blow the dust off our cars, and then once parked put tarps down to make sure we didn’t drop oil onto the salt.

There were spectator areas by the pits and start line, and most drivers and their crews were really happy to talk about their vehicles.


The 120km’s of  gravel and corrugated  tracks to Mount Ive’s Station and the DLRA campsite was worth it. An amazing few days in the heat and salt watching everything from a postie bike to a jet scream by.

Spectators 

Jane in the drivers seat

The Yorke Peninsular

24 to 30 February
We had a week to spare before speed week dry lake racing on Lake Gairdner so thought we'd explore Innes National Park, right down on the 'foot' of the Yorke Peninsular 'boot'.

The peninsular is about 300km from tip to toe, and we drove though unending fields of wheat or stubble, till we entered the national park. The beaches were white sand, clear water and perfect for swimming. Kevin liked the surf beaches, but I preferred the still waters of the rock pools.

Pondalowie surf beach

Inneston, now abandoned and turned into a national park, was once a thriving gypsum and salt mining town  from the late 1800's till about 1930.

Many of the old buildings are still there, we walked the historic town, and as usual Kevin managed to find an old wood fired bakers oven... not working though.

wood fired oven.. still in great condition

Cape Spenser lighthouse

 Each of the Headlands have light houses to assist navigate ships through the Spencer gulf, though there were shipwrecks scattered off the coast and beaches a plenty. Testament to the harshness of the southern ocean.

relaxing camp-side

We had 5 nights at Innes Nat park, and each day we swan, bush walked and relaxed... a great location. We camped near the 'fisherman's village' which is a handful of old shacks that existed before the national park was declared. Mainly used during the cray season Nov to May, and on a limited lease hold so wont be there for much longer.

If you are looking for bush camping and great beaches, with very few other people, this is a must when visiting SA.

browns beach .rock pool,

Kevin checking out the surf

Boarder Country

16 to 23 February
After a couple of nights in Euston on the NSW side of the Murray we headed off to drive the Old Mail Road from Mildura to Boarder Cliffs, to camp near the Old Customs House.

Old mail route

The Sturt highway would have been easier, but the fun was in retracing the route of the old mail delivery ... all on dirt roads, no houses there anymore and didn't pass another vehicle in the 2 hours it took drive the 120km.
The route skirts the Murray sunset national park. The landscape is flat, dusty and very dry, unless under irrigation, the contrast is stark. We spent a few days bush camping just over the SA boarder by the old customs building, and along with bush walking, we found a fabulous brewery on the Murray built in an old shearing shed.

Murray sunset national park

Camping Lake Bonney

 After a quick stay and dip in Lake Bonney, and a delicious long lunch at Banrock Station Winery we headed to Mannum to catch up with Bev & Gary at their weekender. Surprise guests were supplied, in our netball friends Josie & Mark, so it was some weekend.

Peach picking

The view from the Mannum balcony was over wetlands, very pretty, and it was a weekend of eating, drinking, laughing and even a trip to the local orchard to collect peaches for preserving.

Kev, Bev and Mary

River Red Gums

9th to 15th February
The Murray river is Australia's largest at 2,375kms in length, forming much of the boarder between NSW and Victoria, eventually flowing into the sea in South Australia. Red River gums line the banks, and plenty of state forests for free camping.

Murray river flow

We met up with Sonya and Gary our camping buddies for the week, and headed out from Rutherglen,.. no time for winery tours, we were on the red river gums drive.
Base camp was in Barmah National Park VIC, alongside the Murray, the area was previously grazing lands and there were still remnants of old stock yards, fences and even feral horses which we got very close to on a morning walk. Very exciting.



The river provides habitat for plenty of bird life including kingfishers and egrets. the Wetlands boat tour took us up the narrowest part of the Murray, current was at about 7km/hr, all heading to South Australia.

Red river gum drive

The surrounding paddocks and forests were extremely dry, considering the volume of water heading down the Murray.
With Environmental flows in place, and regulators fitted to creeks, every bit of water goes down the river and isn't diverted unless allocated. Being in drought currently, the difference was stark




Once we reached Gunbower state forest we camped on the creek, and the boat ramp allowed us easy access to the water for a swim,.... much needed once we'd run out of shower water. Plenty of forest walks to do including the search, successful after the third attempt, to find the 'Eagle Tree' estimated to be between 800 and 1,000 years old.

Sonya and Gary, dwarfed by the Eagle tree

 Eagle tree

Wee Jasper to Jugiong

1st to 8th February
After spending January circling Sydney whilst Kevin waited for the specialist to give his shoulder the all clear, we finally managed to point the camper southwest and head out for the big trip in February.

Micalong creek reserve

Wee Jasper was our first stop, camping on Micalong creek which feeds into Burinjuck dam. It's only about 60kms from Yass, with the last few km's windy and steep to get down into the valley.

We were the only ones camping there, so had the place to ourselves, hot & cold showers and flushing toilets.. luxury!




Wee Jasper is a well known fishing spot for Trout, and we saw at least half a dozen brown and rainbow trout as we walked along the creek banks. Didn't try fishing, they looked too clever... but the water was refreshing, and we swam in the creek each day.

Jane testing her croc sandels

Kev heading back from a creek swim

After a few days we packed up and headed to Jugiong showground to drink champagne with Michelle and celebrate Phil's 'special' birthday. That afternoon and evening we had about 10mls of rain, didn't break the drought, but made packing up next day a muddy experience.

birthday gathering

before the rains

Coolah Tops

21st to 28th January
We've done the driving loop back to Molong to pick up our camper for a few days at Coolah Tops.
Back on the farm shearing is about to start, though ironically after two weeks of heat wave, there was 15mls of rain, which wet the sheep... so shearing was delayed.

wool classing table

shearing boards

At 1100m above sea level we were a balmy 33C, and camped at the Barracks campground, Coolah Tops National Park.

grass tree forest

 

Only a 500m walk away from where we were camping was a forest of about 200 huge grass trees.

The early settlers discovered the resin made a good explosive, and its believed that the Germans used the resin during WW1.

spur walk

rebuilt stable yard

 Before the heat of the day set in, we did a walk most mornings. Not being great with heights made walking out on the spurs an experience.




With 5 days at Coolah we managed to set up everything. The full annex, shower, chairs tables... the whole box and dice, including table cloths and fly covers. Kev was of course suitably horrified at the non blokeish additions.

annex up

 

The new solar blanket, in addition to our old 'A' frame solar panel (both rated at 150 watts) enabled us to run the 2 Waeko fridges for the full 5 days... who needs electricity.

 

side walls set

            




Plenty of wild life, with wallaby's, kangaroos, parrots, feral goats, deer and pigs... and yes there was also the mandatory huntsman spider in the toilet.... hidden in the toilet paper roll!

'Fancy' toilet... but still a long drop 

NSW Central West

14th to 20th January.
What better way to spend a 42C day than drive to Dubbo and Coonabarabran,.... air conditioning in the car made for cool travelling.

Proof pink elephants exist

The road from Molong to Cumnock through Yeovil to Dubbo has a 120km ‘animals on bikes’ paddock art sculpture trail, with 45 different creatures along the way. Yes, Kevin did see a pink elephant.

In Dubbo we visited the historic Old Dubbo Gaol, no longer in use but fully restored. Small dark prisoner cells, outdoor bathrooms and hangman's gallows in the courtyard, not an inviting place to be in the 1880's.




When in Coonabarabran we ventured into the Warumbunlge National Park to have a look at the new visitors centre.

Kevin at the Warumbungles

 In 2013 bush-fires started by a lightening strike destroyed 80% of the park including the visitors centre. Then, two weeks later a flash flood washed away the exposed top soil, luckily the bush is resilient and is recovering.

We did a couple of short walks ,but it was too hot, so we headed back to the motel pool  for a swim.







The Australia wide heat wave was still in full swing, so we headed to the Central Coast for some coastal cool breeze. We may not be at Yowie Bay but we're still doing plenty of swimming.

The skillion at Terrigal

Sydney to Molong

3rd to 13th January.
The trip has started, we’ve packed up all we think we need for the next 12 months and hit the road. Exactly how many handbags and shoes needed is a bit of a guess, but I’m sure we’ll make do. First stop is Molong just outside Orange with our friends Julia and Reg at their Homestead, Larras Lake.

The original wing of the homestead was built in 1830, with additions through the years. Today it’s a lovely old home with many rooms, thick walls and high ceilings to help beat the heat. Days have been in the mid 30C’s so having a pool in the home yard has been fabulous.

There’s great examples of stone work on the property, including the handmade fences and arches. Whilst Kevin’s shoulder continues to recover we’ve been staying in the house which is a real treat..... we’ll be camping soon enough.

Being a working sheep property, we’re a week or so away from shearing and the sheep are mustered in readiness, so hopefully we’ll be able to have a look at that.

Not much farming actin for us as we’ve been siteseeing, swimming or keeping out of the heat, though we have chased a stray lamb back to the flock if that counts.

Whilst we’ve only been away since 3rd January, we’re enjoying the opportunity to do and see new things that travel presents.