Settling back into life on the road

After leaving Adelaide we just went a short distance through the hills and found a pleasant donation camp at Tintinara, besides a man made Lake. Beautiful for the night, and yes the heater seems to be working alright.

From here a skip, hop & jump over the border and down Lake Taylor near Horsham. Yes, we have stayed here before, but knew there was plenty of room as school holidays are about to start.

Spring is in the air, all the Canola is in flower and looking bright and wonderful for as far as the eye can see. Still not seeing much sunshine, but we live in hope.

Then a one nighter at St Arnaud (again), and over to Shepparton where we are booked into a van park as we need to leave the van unattended so we can pop into Melbourne for a couple of days.

 

We ended staying in Shep for a few more days enjoying a bit of sunshine and walks around Victoria Lake, and along the Goulburn River.

It was also here we watched the AFL Grandfinal. And what a fantastic result.

🦁🎉 

Now into Cobram, and the weather is coming around. (Not before time)

We decided to see out the rest of the school holidays here, a beautiful spot and close to friends to share a drink or two.

                                                         Plus koala spotting each day

Oh it's a hard life.

Pictorial diary of our month in Adelaide

Ducks in the backyard, yes it was the weather for them

Storm damaged rock wall down at the shack

And a few less steps

St Peters Cathedral visit

              Grace & I visit Gumeracha

       Back home in Cairns all but briefly.

Then back to Adelaide for Grace's op, all went smoothly and healing well. After having the van in storage for a month, she's back out on the road ready to head off on the last leg of this adventure.

Bitter sweet

 We've been feeling a little flat this week and not much to report.

On departing Jamestown made our way into Tarlee, 

which has some interesting WWII history, we were planning to do some wine tasting through the Barossa but with not much solar coming in (Brrr....), we opted to head into Kapunda and onto power for a night, get batteries up to full before parking the girl up in Adelaide while we appreciate the time we have with family and friends.

So with that I have farewelled Les as he flies back home for a short time, with me to follow shortly.

                                  It's Jetstar not a UFO, a UFO would be Grace's way home.

And that's the end of this leg of our trip for a few weeks. See you on the flip side when we head out again. Not sure when....

Bush camps and camp fires

 A little sad to be leaving Leigh Creek, Parachilna Gorge is still closed, as is most of the Flinders, so headed further South. Not going via Port Augusta this time, decided to follow in the footsteps of RM Williams and following the route of his pioneering adventures.

                                                   Goodbye Flinders, maybe next time.

Our first camp, thanks to Wiki, was a creek side bush camp near Carrieton. Beautiful spot, and even though the creek was dry, there was evidence of recent rains by how green everything appeared.

Plenty of fire wood and perfect weather for sitting around a fire. And yes, at last, Les has got the drone flying again, and I managed to cook up some camp oven damper.  

Ended up staying here for a few nights as even though it wasn't far off the road, minimal traffic made it extremely peaceful. Had one other van come in for one night whilst we were there but apart from them didn't see a soul.

Drove further south along the RM Williams Way mid week and camped near Pekina Dam Reserve just on the outskirts of Ororoo. Did a short hike through the reserve to find some hidden gems in the way of 19th century poetry, and early 1900 engineering feats. Another camp fire at this camp, a free camp on private property, thank you to whoever allows that, great idea.

Pekina Dam

And finally for this week we ended up at Jamestown, a fitting end for the week as it was the birthplace of RM Williams and we have camped at the Robinson RV park behind his memorial. Have access to water here so have done a few loads of washing to get rid of that camp fire smell that permeates through everything.

                                        Jamestown, a beautiful town with so much history.

                We are camped bottom right in this photo, overlooking a very green sheep paddock.

We Did It....

 Well, update, the track opened with caution, so yep, bugger it, we went.🤞🤞🤞

The road wasn't too bad at all, a few corrugations, but nothing too major.

We made our first camp at Lake Cadibarrawirracanna, try saying that after a few drinks. This camp would have to be one of the most scenic spots we have ever camped, and we had it all to ourselves.

Beautiful.

                                                               Yes it is still cold

We only stayed the one night here as yes, rain is on its way, again....

We made it into William Creek around lunch time, just as the rains arrived.

                     Parked up next to the runway for the night in the William Creek Campground

                                           Displays of the Skylark, test rockets from Woomera

William Creek was so busy, unable to get a table for lunch in the pub, yes, it was that busy, quite a few vans but even more people flying in on scenic flights to see the waters flowing into Lake Eyre. (Which, on a side note has just reached the lake by way of Warburton and Coopers Creek, locals don't think it will be enough to fill the lake.

Along with the rain was wind, a lot of wind, which actually helped our cause assisting with the drying of the roads. So the next day around lunch we headed off further along the Track. 10-15km out of William Creek was really bad corrugations, but after that the road wasn't bad, passed so many vehicles, everyone coming to see the lake.

                           We stopped in at Beresford Siding, an old ruin from the Ghan Days

                                                                The Oodnadatta Track

Then made camp at the Curdimurka Siding

Damage from a previous flood, hard to believe the waters ever got this high and furious.

                                                             Another beautiful sunset

                  Then our last day on the Track we stopped to look at the waterless lake, of course

Made it into Marree at a reasonable hour so kept on moving and ended up camping at the Farina Township Campground. A ruin of a township that was desserted in 1967, but was a major hub in its day as it was where the railway changes guages. Volunteers come up from Adelaide each winter to open up and operate the rebuilt underground bakery. The original homestead has been rebuilt and is the cafe.

They have done an amazing job.

The campground was huge with heaps of space, even had a fire and a roast lamb in the camp oven

With our final run this week, we came through Lyndhurst, passing a herd of horses heading down the main street of town and finally into Leigh Creek Caravan Park.

Yeah, Leigh Creek and a caravan park. Washing day or days. It has been so long since we have had spare water to use for washing, with water costing $67/kl in Coober Pedy it was a case of just fill the tanks for drinking and showers. So now in Leigh Creek comes clean linen day. How exciting..

Also whilst here we have taken in the local sights, like Indian Head.

                                      Aroona Dam

                                  Emu Creek Railway Bridge

And we whilst away our time watching the local emus wander through the park and relaxing doing my cross stitch

                            A relaxing Sunday