This edition documents the rest of my South Australian experience to the Victorian border.
The date is Feb 16th and I'm on my way to Whyalla. I called into Arno Bay and after walking the jetty I then walked along a 700 metre boardwalk through mango groves to the river inlet where I met a couple from Melrose who I chatted with for some time.
Arno Bay mangrove tree walk at the river inlet.
Next stop was Cowell to eat my last Eyre Peninsular oyster lunch before arriving in Whyalla and parking my van at the Foreshore caravan park. There's a fabulous wetlands in Whyalla with a cafe, walking tracks, lots of bird life and gardens. The cafe is meant to be one of the best cafe's in Whyalla ,but it was closed (Sunday evening) so I walked around the lakes and gardens.
I liked Whyalla. It’s an attractive city with a stunning lookout from Hummock Hill despite all the mining infrastructure around the pier and on low tide the ocean views are quite stunning. People walk all over the firm sand and shallow water during low tide, but at high tide all the sand flats are covered.
One of my favourite photos.
This photo was taken from out the front of the caravan park.
When the tide is in, it is completely covered in water.
The following morning after getting the other two tyres fitted on my car I drove out to Point Lowly and had a dip in the water at the wharf beach. The weather was superb.
Point Lowly Lighthouse
Wharf beach at Point Lowly
I was back in time to visit the Whyalla Maritime Museum and do a tour of the “Whyalla”, the very first minesweeping ship built at Whyalla. Over 60 minesweeping ships were built at Whyalla for the war and only 2 are still intact. They are an unstable ship being flat bottomed, but were designed to diffuse mines during the war and once the war was over they were scraped for their metal. I’m told the only other one still around is on display at Gem Pier in Melbourne.
HMAS Whyalla - the first minesweeping ship and the first ship built by the Whyalla shipyard and was launched May 1941.
Models of all the minesweeper ships built in Whyalla
The process of minesweeping...as far as I can recall from what I read at the museum, only one ship was blown up in the process of destroying a mine during the war.
The museum also had an amazing model railway of the Whyalla mines
I finally attended a Rotary meeting - Whyalla Norrie Rotary Club, which was very close to the caravan park. They were a very small club of 7...2 members were apologies for the night 😢
I would have liked to have had more opportunities to attend Rotary meetings than what I did, but it just didn't fit into the schedule as often as I expected it might.
A beautiful Whyalla sunset from the caravan park overlooking a beach with the tide now in .
Feb 18th I packed up and drove into Port Augusta, which was only 80kms north. I parked my van at the Discovery Park for two nights and went sightseeing...once again!! The Wadlata Outback Centre at the information Centre had a fantastic museum covering local history, how the Flinders Ranges was formed, mining history and local indigenous history. I spent most of the afternoon in the museum, but could have spent a whole day. During the rest of my Port Augusta stay I climbed the Rotary Park water tower lookout, visited the Australia Arid Land Botanical Gardens, walked along the cliff top and the beach at the Spencer Gulf inlet, had a fine dining Indian inspired dinner at a heritage listed restaurant at the golf club. The meal was superb!!!
View from the top of the water tower overlooking Port Augusta
The 250 hectares Arid Land Botanical gardens feature hundreds of low rainfall Australian plants, lots of walking trails and a beautiful gift shop and cafe. My phone battery ran out just as I got there...doh!!!, but I did get this one...
A beautiful bright yellow spotted blue tongue lizard/skink, which I almost stepped on.
Spencer Gulf inlet...I walked all the way along the cliff to the bridge at the end and nearly got blown with the force of the wind. The following morning I did the same walk this time along the beach...much more protected from the wind😀
...amongst the mangroves
A quick visit into Port Augusta's CBD to get some groceries and take a walk along the old original Jetty and
I was ready to move on to Moonta.
The people from Melrose who I spoke with on the boardwalk at Arno Bay suggested I drive through to Point Germaine and Moonta via Melrose, which would take me inland through the southern section of the Flinders Ranges. I was so glad I did as the scenery was superb and the Flinders Ranges are quite a different mountain range to anything I had seen so far. (I'm not going any further into the Flinders Ranges on this trip, but look forward to exploring them another time).
When I arrived at Melrose I pulled up for a coffee and the couple I had met at Arno Bay happened to be out walking their dog and recognised my van (it's not hard to recognise 😀) so another chat took place. Travelling is very sociable and people want to chat and hear your story and visa versa.
Next stop was Port Germaine for lunch, which meant I drove west again, back to the east coast of the Spencer Gulf. In 1881 when the Port Germaine Pier was opened it was the longest Jetty in the Southern hemisphere (1680m). The water when the tide is out is extremely shallow and the jetty was built to accomodate grain loading ships. The jetty is now only 1532m due to storm damage closing the last 150m.
The start of the walk to the pier from the grain shed showing the historic rail line.
I haven't even reached the pier yet. This photo is taken from the lighthouse
I'm now on the pier, but still got a long way to go
Got there!!
Now on my way back
I've started having trouble with my fridge in the van. The 12 volt battery is faltering and the fridge keeps going off. Port Pirie is on my way so I decide to pull in at an auto electricians and see what the problem might be. It turns out the plug has overheated at some stage and the connection has been compromised. I can't get a new one fitted until tomorrow so I stay in Port Pirie for the night and park my van at the Beachside Caravan Park. I plugged the fridge into electricity to get it going again and took a walk along the foreshore and did another jetty walk. This time a very short jetty where the locals were not catching much!!!
Port Pirie Jetty, The caravan park was only about 500 metre to the left
Feb 21st...It took about an hour to get the caravan plug wiring replaced the following morning and then I left for Moonta calling into Port Broughton for lunch and a walk along another fairly long jetty
I did take a selfie through this frame, but it wasn't as good as this one, as my face hid the view😆
A view from out on the pier
I arrived in Moonta Bay mid afternoon and parked my van at the Moonta Bay caravan park.
Another great jetty to walk with lots of people fishing for crab and squid. I took a drive to Port Hughes , spent an evening in the pub and had a great meal and took a walk out on the sand bar at low tide.
Moonta Jetty
Looking back to town
Walking on the sand bar at low tide
sand bar print!!!
I decided to bypass Adelaide. The Adelaide Fringe Festival was on, caravan parks were full and I needed to have spent some time planning and booking ahead, which I hadn't done. Instead I drove through Gawler, and then passed through some Barossa Valley wine growing country on my way to Murray Bridge. I have to say the country roads in South Australia were awful!! Roads in general in SA are not good especially when pulling a van!! An uneven/bumpy service creates a lot of drag on the car, things get jolted around in the caravan😡And I have to travel even slower than normal!!!
I parked my van at Murray Bridge Marina & Caravan Park for 2 nights to visit my cousin. As I drove into Murray Bridge I felt like I had arrived home 😀
...The Murray river has a familiarity about it no matter where on the river you are 😍
Murray Bridge was completed in 1879 and was initially a shared rail and road before the separate rail bridge was built in 1925.
House boat Marina
with my cousin Marcele.
24th Feb - I'm now on my way to Robe in the south east corner of South Australia,
It's a place I have wanted to visit for many years and I wasn't disappointed.😍 There is a relaxed holiday vibe to the town with some gorgeous beaches, cliff walks, a large marina and a lot of historical buildings including goal ruins. The retail strip included art galleries, wine tasting bars, cafe's, restaurants and pubs. I also visited a local brewery that's just opened and the fresh fish shop to get one of Robe's famous Southern rock lobsters.
This gallery was also a wine tasting bar for Karratta Wines. The sculptures in the centre are made from plastic bags and straws 😍
The town also has a fantastic recycle shop called "Transmutation" where they make some amazing products. One being kitchen bowls out of bread tags. Recently Ikea took on some of their products which meant they have had to open a manufacturing plant to keep up supply.
Transmutation
These are some of the walkways around the peninsula areas.
The main beach Robe
Dinner...yum
Simple, but...it was good!!!
Not far south of Robe is another small holiday village, Beachport. I dropped in for a look around and grabbed a coffee, but I think I need to come back here for a holiday. It is a smaller version of Robe and looks delightful.
Beachport jetty
I was now on a mission to keep moving as I planned to be home by March 18th to attend the Rotary Conference. I was also keen to spend a week with my daughter and her family at Broulee on the east coast. They had had a very close call with fires and I just wanted to spend some time with them.
One of the goals of this trip was to circumnavigate Australia and that meant I still had to drive the coast of Victoria. My brother rang to see if I was going to be home in time to celebrate his birthday on March 1st, so I decided to surprise him. I crossed the SA/VIC border at 2pm on 26th Feb, which gave me four days to explore Portland to Airey's Inlet, drive the Great Ocean Road and see the 12 Apostles coastline.
Although I haven't completed documenting the twelve months travel blog, as I post this I am now back in Albury. I probably have two more instalments to finish . The coast of Victoria and a summary of the year's travel.
Life as we know it has dramatically changed!!! so I'll get them out in the next couple of weeks. I've got plenty of time on my hands at the moment to write!!! paint!!! and make music!!!
I hope everyone keeps busy, stay's safe and keeps well, both physically and mentally. My thoughts are with you all.
🥂Anne