Beetles in heaven

Next stop was lovely Elliston, home of the BEST playground in Australia (so far). The community banded together to apply for grants, then built this incredible playground, visitors’ centre and picnic ground. With so many playground stops, we are becoming quite critical of various arrangements, but this one gets a big thumbs-up! We actually stopped there so Bill and Zara could do school but Sash could take full advantage of the cool set-up. He had a great time and made a little buddy (although got quite distressed that his buddy, Jarrah, couldn’t pronounce his name properly and called him ‘Shasa’ - a bit weird considering he still calls himself 'Sasa').

We also visited the local op-shop to buy a couple of pieces of clothing and to stock Zara up on chapter books. We have to stop at every possible op shop and second-hand bookshop to keep up with her insatiable appetite for books. She sucks them up them almost as quickly as we can buy them – hence she is reading some very strange, old-fashioned, sometimes pretty trashy and often inappropriate novels - from Anne of Green Gables (we can’t even understand half the words in this!) to the Babysitters Club (teenage girls who are interested in shopping and boys!). Harry Potter and Narnia are still her favourites (we’re reading them with her at night, then she re-reads the chapters during the day). Fortunately, the girl is not fussy and would just as happily read the cereal box as a work of great literature. Caught her attempting ‘For the Term of His Natural Life’ in the back of the car recently because she had finished all her books – definitely not appropriate reading for a 6-year old. Must seek out some more children’s books soon. But it is wonderful to see her having the time and space to nurture her love of reading – one of the massive benefits of this year away.

We finally tore ourselves away from Elliston and headed up towards Streaky Bay. We stopped at Murphy’s haystacks (cool big rocks that were mistaken by some dope for haystacks...) and then headed to a couple of beachside campgrounds only to find them full. It was getting dark and we were starting to kick ourselves for farting around in Elliston for so long, but we pushed onto Streaky Bay with the idea of staying at the caravan park. When we got there, however, it was so busy and we couldn't bear the thought of camping smack up against our neighbours so decided to push onto another camping spot at Perlubie Beach, just north of Streaky Bay. Meanwhile we were all starving and getting grumpy so we looked around for some dinner. After much debate, we decided a bit reluctantly on pizza – which ended up being some of the best pizza we’ve ever eaten! Relaxing on the jetty, stuffing our faces with sensational gourmet pizza while Bill pulled in a couple of squid for the next day’s lunch, our equalibrium was quickly restored… 

It was well and truly dark when we rolled back into the car and headed off to find Perlubie Beach – which was particularly challenging owing to road closures and a distinct lack of signage. We finally got there and set up in the dark, sidestepping millions of enormous black leggy beetles (turned out they took over the beach every evening as soon as the sun went down). In the morning (warm, sunny and perfect) we were thrilled to wake to find ourselves camped right on yet another beautiful beach. Sunrises and sunsets were magic and the water was clear and turquoise. Zara and Kate did school just metres from the lapping water. We swam, fished, walked and generally enjoyed ourselves. Also nice to meet Zack and Kirsty from Cairns who accompanied Bill fishing and shared their cuttlefish catch with us.

A couple of blissful days followed and just as we were deciding to stay there forever, the wind and rain hit and nearly lifted the tent off the ground, complete with sleeping children. Friendly fellow campers kindly came and told us that a king tide was expected in the next day or so, and should we stay we would most likely be washed away to South America. So, after some consideration, we decided to pack up in the driving rain (shoving 700 black beetles and at least 3 mice into our trailer as we did so) and hotfoot it to greener (and drier) pastures. Such are the highs and lows of camping!

Walkers' Rock and future plans...

Bidding farewell to our dolphin buddies, we bumped our way out of beautiful Coffin Bay National Park. We decided to backtrack to Port Lincoln to stock up on groceries (K was a bit concerned that we might run out of Tabasco) and to buy new and better batteries to power our fridges etc. Then onward ever onward – we headed up the western side of the Eyre peninsular. It was a short drive because there was not much left of the day. We set up camp at yet another lovely white beach – Walkers Rocks near Elliston.  We have been trying to spend 2 nights anywhere we stop so we are not constantly unpacking and packing up again – and to maintain that delicious feeling of ambling around Australia – so we spent the next day pottering around the campsite fixing some bits and pieces (Bill displayed his superior sewing skills by fixing a tear in the camper-trailer cover), ran up and down the sand dunes, collected shells and went for a bike-ride along the dirt road.

Our fellow campers were grey nomads from all over. It’s mind-blowing, the grey nomad thing – there are SO many of them and they drift around the country in their caravans, some of them for a few months but many of them for much longer if not permanently. It’s like when you first have a baby and stop full-time work and suddenly realise that there’s another world outside the office where parents pushing prams all emerge during working hours to take over the streets – while you are working, you just don’t realise that this alternate world exists. And go almost anywhere (caravan accessible) in Australia and you will find an army of retirees sitting outside their vans in the sun, or heading off at dawn armed with fishing rods, or setting up picnic lunches (with thermoses) overlooking fabulous views. Whether they have a rusty old 1960s caravans or the taj mahal of caravans, they just seem to have a great time. While some are sour-faced and grumpy, mostly they are friendly and relaxed. The kids have happily come across a few kind, grandkid-missing folk who dish out sweet biscuits in their caravans. But what a life they lead! We can see ourselves there already. Indeed, we are already discussing our preferred future set-up!

Addicted to oysters in Coffin Bay

We stopped in busy Port Lincoln to stock up on all items that may not be available in small-town stores this side of Perth. Kate toyed with getting another bottle of Tabasco to feed her serious addiction over the Nullabor, but decided not to indulge herself. We lunched in a cool little organic shop which sold dubious books about diets to cure cancer and improve your sexlife but also made great fresh salads, wraps and falafel. We were stinky and dusty with streaks of dirt in our moustaches, but the locals were still kind. While Bill and Sash went to discuss batteries with the local auto-electrician, Kate and Zara hit the second-hand bookshop where they were thrilled to stumble accross the Mrs Pepperpot's Omnibus (for some time Kate had been telling Zara about these amazing books from her childhood about an old lady who sometimes shrinks to the size of a pepperpot - Z has since read and loved the entire book and loved it - phew, always good to have childhood fondnesses substantiated by the next generation).

Anyhoo, back on the road for a short trip to the lovely town of Coffin Bay - famous for its oysters. We set up in the busy caravan park and considering we were camping so close to our neighbours we were practically sleeping in their annex, we were thrilled to find that they were super friendly. After we had set-up, Richard, Roxanne and Lucas easily lured us into their tent with offers of oysters (from local store for $8 a dozen - right off the boat). Great company and great oysters. Thanks to Richard for the shucking lessons which have already served us well. With our tastebuds whetted for local seafood, we dined at the local pub that night. It was good food but they were super busy so K and B worse for wear with drink by the time their seafood platter arrived. Kate accused of being sunburnt in the ladies toilets - but just warm with wine! Zara and Sash spent the entire next day with new friends Sasha (girl) and Oliver in the caravan park playground while B and K scrubbed dust and balsamic vinegar out of foodboxes and washed saltwater off all cutlery etc. Sad moment in Coffin Bay when we finished the last of Dave J's chilli relish - we still think of it fondly at every meal : (

Hair washed, tubs scrubbed and loaded with dozens of oysters, we packed up and headed into Coffin Bay national park. Here we finally put the landcruiser through its paces and realised why people buy them - it seems to be able to grunt through anything. Even loaded down with all our crap and through the softest sand, we managed to drag ourselves through. We tried to help another couple out of a bog but of course couldn't find our d-shackles (note to selves - probably smart to store recovery gear somewhere handy when 4wheel driving). Kate's 4-wheel drive course really came in handy as she remembered random and irrelevant driving tips at various inopportune moments. Thankfully for the bogged couple, a friendly and knowledgeable family drove up and had them out in a jiffy! Thankfully we made it safely to our camping spot, Black Springs. And wow - totally magic place. Right on a sheltered beach with crystal clear water and a welcoming party of dolphins jumping out of the water to great us... We set up with a beach view and settled into paradise. It was pretty quite except for a friendly older couple who shamed us with their energy, and a group of locals with a coupla kids. We set up chairs on the beach at oyster-oclock and watched the kids playing in their pretend shop (with real prices... the introduction of pocket money in Zara's life appears to have turned her into quite the little capitalist entrepeneur but that's another story). A clear night sky gave us an amazing view of the stars from the beach. Next day, we played at the beach and fished and took a short walk. All was perfect until we started noticing more and more locals arriving and hooning past our campsite to join their mates. By 5pm the techno was pumping on the beach and the party didn't stop. Fortunately the kids slept through it all and Kate and Bill gritted their teeth and put up with it. We recovered our tempers the next day and had a lovely time driving through the park, along beaches, over dunes and through rocky plains. Bill caught a Banjo Shark while Kate, Zara and Sash ran up and down massive soft sand dunes. We arrived back at the campsite and were thrilled to find that the party group had packed up and left! The day was so warm that we decided to get the swags off the roofrack and sleep on the beach.  But as we were preparing for our night under the stars, a new convey of locals hooned up and took up where the previous night’s party had left off. Needless to say the swags went back onto the roofrack and we hunkered down in our tent. No boombox on the beach but lots of loud, drunken swearing and laughing right outside our tent. To the man with the kookaburra laugh and the woman who screeched the f word all night – WE HATE YOU!

Nonetheless, Sash and Kate got up and headed off early the next day to hike to Black Rocks on the other side of the peninsular. It was a lovely walk through the dunes and across rocky plains – and Sash was a trooper (3 easy strategies for hiking with a 3 yo – lots dried fruit along the way, musli bar at the end and lots of talk about his upcoming birthday as we walk along – on this walk he decided that he wants a chocolate cake shaped like a log with someone sitting on it and a Tasmanian tiger and a backdrop of gum trees… B to be in charge of birthday cake this year!). Got back to find the party group packing up (although leaving toilets unusable and a nice pile of rubbish... Kate and Bill could have hugged the softly spoken Col from Leongatha who set up in their wake – not only did he lend us his generator to charge our failing batteries he (and destroy the peace ourselves for a bit!) he then accompanied Bill on a highly successful night fishing expedition (garfish and flathead - yum). And not a peep at night. Peace was finally restored to paradise... 

God bless quiet campers!     

                               

           

Easter Bunny, fishing mad Frenchfolk and razor-fish paella

We stayed for 6 nights in Lincoln National Park - at a spot called Fisherman's Point (chosen for obvious reasons). We decided to set up and stay put rather than try and move around over the Easter break. We arrived on the Wednesday night before good Friday, and found the place busy but not too crowded. It did get super crowded over the Easter break and we were hedged in on all sides, but everyone was surprisingly quiet and friendly so it was actually fine.

It was really hot when we arrived so we were thrilled to spend some time on the beach and to have a swim in the beautiful turquoise water. Sash and Zaz collected so many things from the beach that we started to feel that we were singlehandedly destroying the environment. Sash developed a passion for finding crab claws - he called them 'crabby' and made up little beds for them in the tree branches.

Bill enjoyed considerable squid success off the rocks there - so we ate like kings as Bill experimented with different ways of cooking and eating the squid. Kate went through the campsite boasting about Bill's ability to haul in squid in great numbers with the greatest of ease, and he soon attracted a gang of eager dudes hoping to learn his secrets. Naturally he struggled to catch anything from then on... Kate to keep her big mouth shut from now on! A massive crowd of French people set up camp next to us. We were amazed at their commitment to any form of fishing - it seemed that any time of day they could be seen storming down to the beach with rods, spears, knives, snorkels, nets, lights and various other forms of equipment. They were out with their rods and flippers at dawn and still spearing crabs at midnight. We actually didn't see them do anything else. Bill was sufficiently impressed at this level of passion and so swapped tips and stories with Jerome, Pierre and the rest.

We met a lovely family who were heading home to Brisbane after 12 months away - they had done a very similar trip to the one we have planned and were full of useful tips and advice. Their kids, Priya and James, were similar ages to ours so many happy hours were spent playing. Zara and Priya spent a day in our tent making beds for Priya's barbies and playing all sorts of other secret games. Kumar and Bill joined forces to battle the Razor fish (a bugger to get out of their shells - but sooo tasty!) and managed to get a big pile of them, plus heaps of crabs and squid. To celebrate, Kumar and Jill whipped up a fabulous paella which we ate ate their place (van) - was delicious!

There was much excitement at our camp over the imminent arrival of the Easter Bunny. Fears that it wouldn't find us in the National Park were assuaged by the memory of the Tooth Fairy finding us in the wild west of Tasmania. We boiled eggs, dyed them with crepe paper and then painted them with acrylic paints. They looked pretty cool and were well-received by most of the other campers when the kids donned their bunny ears and went around the campsite handing them out on Easter Sunday. Of course, the Easter Bunny was very generous and the kids spent a happy couple of days eating chocolate! Sash has been asking almost every day since when next Easter is. Ahhhh the interminable 12 months between the good times for children.

The first warm days were followed by some pretty crappy weather. A huge dust storm came up on Good Friday. Everything was covered with dust - inside and out. By the time we left, we had never seen our boxes and equipment so dirty. Bill's hair collected so much dust it began sticking straight up and Zara threatened to dye it blue and call him Marge Simpson. We are all getting steadily hairier - anyone who has seen pics of Bill recently will note the hairy face (Kate reckons he's a cross between Boris Becker and Bear Grylls...). For those of you who have witnessed Sash's hair at its most mop-like - you should see it now! Kate has been trimming fringes with blunt scissors to keep hair out of eyes - but we are all looking pretty odd already.

Mt Remarkable, then onto Lincoln National Park

After stocking up on provisions (including 2 rolls of veggie loaf - a weird and hard-to-get vegetarian sandwich loaf that Kate, Zara and Sash are quite partial to in our daily sandwiches...) and saying farewell to Adelaide we drove north to Mt Remarkable. Kate was keen to climb the mountain and so we camped at the east side of the national park for easy access to the walking track. We ended up setting up at the Melrose Showgrounds - which was all quite odd. Some local folk were setting up for a Landrover expo (which made us a bit nervous given the reported animosity between Landcruiser drivers and Landrover fans...) with gazebos and witches hats. We were facing a long drive the next day, so Kate arose with the birds in order to get up Mt Remarkable and back by midday. It was a beautiful climb - good views and some exciting rock fall crossings. An extra hour was added due to a wrong turn, but much time was made up due to the speedy joy of walking without any children! Back for a pack up with aching legs and then a long drive all the way down the east cost of the Eyre peninsular in a mad rush to reach Lincoln National Park, set up a good campsite, before squaring our shoulders and bracing for the Easter hordes...

Getting beautified and seeing pandas in Adelaide

We had fun in Adelaide. Was surprisingly good to be back in a big smoke for a short time. Neither of us had ever really spent much time there but had heard only good things about it. We stayed in a caravan park right near the heart of Adelaide so we could jump on our bikes, cruise down the bike tracks next to the river and get into the city. The Park was a bit crowded but full of the usual friendly folk. Our neighbours were a nice couple from Brisbane who had left their house in the responsible hand of 20-something children to travel Australia. They were kind enough to let our kids play in their van and showed them the van's fancy step which could be slid in and out at the touch of a button (hours of fun for a 3yo). Sadly they only stayed a couple of nights and were replaced by an older couple from country Victoria who had plenty to say about the perils of iPads, computer games, lazy children and of course the Government giving too much to the 'abos'. We listened politely to the diatribe, then got out of there quick!

Spectacular Japanese dinner the first night - pricey but we were in heaven!

On a perfect sunny day, we cycled to the Adelaide Zoo to see the famous pandas - Funi and Wang Wang. The pandas were cool and so was the rest of it. Saw a flamingo doing a funny dance. After the zoo, we went to see the Lorax movie. As big Dr Seuss fans we were prepared for the worst, but it was actually really good!

Next morning, Kate fulfilled a long-held promise to Zara by taking her to a cheap and cheerful nail-place to get a manicure. It was a bribe to stop Zara biting her nails and worked a treat. By the time we arrived in Adelaide Zara had talons which the ladies at Citi Nails turned into gold-polished beauties! Zara was thrilled, Kate was slightly uncomfortable with the whole deal but got her toenails polished up anyway! Then we hung out in a bookshop and Zara got a book about the human body. Over hot chocolates at a nearby cafe, all patrons were treated to a stream of loud facts about blood cells, ligaments, bones and how babies are made...

Joined by the boys who had cleaned the car and done the shopping, we rode our bikes to the South Australian museum which had lots of cool stuffed animals, a giant squid display and mummies from ancient egypt - amongst other things. Then we jumped back on our bikes and rode off in search of gourmet pizza. Ended up at a place called 'Good Life' where we had a great dinner and bumped into an old family friend of Bill's - bit weird to bump into the one person we know in Adelaide during our 3 night stay there! Cycled back in the dark which was slightly hairy due to Sasha's newness to bike riding - But Bill did a great job riding next to him and grabbing his arm when things got hairy...

Great times in Adelaide but time to get out of there before the Easter hordes hit the nearby camping spots...

Pelicans and sunsets at the Coorong

Next stop was the Coorong in SA - a weird long stretch of skinny peninsular between the sea and a salty lagoon. Hard to describe so look at a map. We knew of it because of Alison Lester's book Are we there yet? (bible of all families travelling Australia) where they stop at the Coorong and the big brother makes them all laugh by saying, 'what a wonderful bird is the pelican, it's beak can hold more that it's belly-can'. Unsurprisingly this phrase was repeated perhaps 100 times during out stay there. There were lots of pelicans there - flying in beautiful formations over our campsite.

We set up camp right next to the lagoon and were greeted with such a spectacular sunset that we almost decided to stay there forever. We had the place to ourselves for a day or so, and then were joined by an older couple from South Australia who spend a lot of time camping and finance their retirement by collecting cans from the roadside and searching campsites and beaches with a metal detector. Bill and Kate had a sudden flash into their future...

At the Coorong, we resumed our usual past-times - Bill hitting the wild and rugged beaches in search of fish, and Kate hitting the walking trails through sand dunes and accross salt lakes. One kid each. We also discovered the fun of driving on the beach. This time, the Go-Pro was held out the window while Bill drove through water crossings and across dunes. Cool footage.

The kids found a few new past-times - making a doll's adventure playground from rocks and dressing up in our clothes a pretending to be us...

We could have stayed longer, but Easter was bearing down on us and we wanted to avoid the Adelaide holiday makers. So, time to head to the big smoke!