DAY 65
17th February, 2021
We drove to Broken Hill. It really does deserve that name: it is literally one big mine. They mine silver and lead there. We didn’t really stay long, just had a look around an old mine, then went to Coles and left.
We got hit by a willy willy on the Silver City Highway! We were buffeted by the wind, and then the tumbleweeds. Very weird experience!
We camped the night at Rufus River / Victoria Lake. There was a small free campsite there by the weir and a shipping container that had a FREE SHOWER! We’re never ones to pass up a free clean! It got really hot in the metal box though, at one point I thought I was going to pass out and couldn’t get the door open!
Lovely sunset again.
DAY 66
18th February, 2021
We drove up the dirt road from the campsite at Rufus and entered South Australia. We had to go through a border check, but it was fine, no drama. Then we continued on to Renmark. This was a really lovely little town on the banks of the Murray. It was also a grape growing region too. But I felt a little uncomfortable as I looked around and saw all the green grass and vines – that water was all being taken out of the Murray River.
We pulled into the information centre and picked up a parks pass for the national parks. It was such a stupid and unnecessarily complicated system! The ladies in the tourism office were also struggling to help – maybe people don’t buy passes very often? But we eventually got it done, and stuck the printout with the reference number to the windscreen. That was literally the only reason we didn’t just do it online, we needed proof in paper form for the car!
We drove to a campsite on the Murray River and set up fairly early. It was a hot day today, about 36 degrees. Josh had a swim in the river. It was too murky for me and there were big fish nearby. Nope. And I had to pour out half a bottle of wine because it had gone off. Sad times.
DAY 67
19th February, 2021
We left the campsite and drove through Morgan, a lovely little country town. I bought some pastries from the bakery there, only I didn’t realise one of them was so big. Josh gave me $10 in cash and the lady had packed them up before I realised, and I didn’t have enough money! She ended up selling them to me for $10. Oops.
We crossed the Murray on the ferry and drove down alongside it. It wasn’t the nicest drive – all dusty and very dry, with patches of bright green.
We crossed the river several other times in our look around, once at Walker Flat and another at Mannum. We stopped and had lunch at Murray Bridge, then kept driving south, crossing on another ferry to a very busy campground at Narrung where we had to stay for the night as there weren't to many other options.
DAY 68
20th February, 2021
We did a big loop this morning, driving along The Coorong, a strip of land separated by water. We couldn’t go across Lake Alexandrina so we had to drive around it, back up to Wellington. From there we drove the Fleurieu way down to Goolwa and Victor Harbour. We were going to camp in the Deep Creek National Park but all the sites were already booked out. So we went to Blowhole Beach and had a look around, plus a drive down the 4wd track, then stopped at a community campsite at the local RFS station for the night. It was pretty much the only site around other than the national park so it ended up being quite busy. The area would definitely benefit from some more camping!
DAY 69
21st February, 2021
Drove to Willunga and up the Old Willunga Road, which forms the “hill” in the Tour Down Under. We visited Hallett’s Cove, which was a point on my map and started to do the loop walk there. It was so busy, full latte-sipping types who don’t move out of the way on the footpath and we both got the shits and went back to the car.
We then drove down through Glenelg, which was super busy because it was a Sunday, and then through Adelaide. This city had a distinctly European feel to it, which was really nice. We stopped off at a takeaway restaurant for lunch - Ricky’s chicken and rice, which was very popular! We ate it in a park which was nice.
We then drove out to the campsite we had booked, Pink Gum in the Onkaparinga National Park up in the Adelaide Hills. It was a cool drive there – windy roads and vineyards – but the campsite was just terrible. We constantly had to put up with the sounds of shotgun blasts from the bird-scarers at the vineyard. Then a whole busload of kids came in who were camping there (thankfully they weren’t too bad). The site had a lot of road noise as well. Really not a good National Park site. There was not much to do in the park either. Don't rate it other than as an overnighter that's not a caravan park. I guess it could have been worse...