Sun 13th to 29th March - Streaky Bay

On the 13th of March we arrived safely in Streaky Bay.  Trish kindly allowed us to stay in the backyard of her home in Montgomerie Terrace.  The house is empty and we had access to power and water ... thanks so much Trish!  This was especially appreciated as our van won't fit into Jenny's driveway and the caravan park was booked out the whole time.


We had a mixture of weather in Streaky.  It was unusually cold at times with a cold wind and for several days we had showers of rain followed by a couple of quite hot days.
It didn't stop us doing much ... if it was cool we went for drives and admired the beautiful scenery.  If the weather was nice, we spent some time on the jetty fishing and catching crabs.

Rick only managed to catch two squid the whole time we were there, but did get quite a few crabs. I was surprised one day when I cast my rod in ... there was a seal swimming around under the jetty.  It seems he was diving and stealing the bait from Rick's crab nets - cheeky bugga!  When we thought he had moved away, Rick dropped his nets again only to find that the seal would mysteriously appear again looking very pleased with himself.

I managed on one occasion to land 5 nice flathead from the jetty that we kept and filleted for dinner ... very nice indeed. I went back to the same spot 3 or 4 times but couldn't catch any more.

On Jen's days off, I would spend some time with her while Rick went down to the jetty.  Jen's little pussycat (Prince) is just adorable and we laughed at his playful antics.  Rick helped Jen close in her shadehouse temporarily so that Prince can have some fun outside.  He would nearly break his neck to get out past Jen whenever she went outside.


Jen joined us most evenings for dinner followed sometimes by a game of Rummykub.  Neither Jen nor I could ever beat Rick.

We had a terrific time in Streaky and it was so good to catch up with Jen again. 

Trish's backyard with our van to the left of the pic

My 5 flathead and Rick's blue swimmer crabs

Prince - Jenny's cat

Fri, 11th to Sat, 12th March - Dutton Bay

We headed off this morning and were only about 40kms out of Port Lincoln heading toward Streaky Bay before we saw a sign to Dutton Bay and Farm Beach.  I suggested maybe it wasn't worth looking at especially as it was a dirt road.  How wrong can you be!!?  

At the end of the road was a very small community and a great little free camp that would only hold about 10 vehicles.  It appeared by the tyre tracks that one spot had recently been vacated and it would fit our van perfectly.  We would also have a great view of the jetty and the bay and some shelter from the wind.  There was a block of flushing toilets with running (but not drinkable) water close by ... what more could a traveller want!!

Later in the day a motorhome owned by a fellow named Graham came in and parked not far from us.  It turns out that Graham had vacated our site earlier in the day to go back into Port Lincoln to buy some fishing gear ... sorry mate ... first in, best dressed!


We went out onto the jetty but didn't manage to catch anything.  Apparently, there are only juvenile King George Whiting in the Bay anyway.  We became quite friendly with Graham who gave us some cooked garfish that he'd caught earlier.



The following day the weather was pleasant again and after not having any luck on the jetty, we took Graham for a drive around the point to a spot where we heard we would get some Whiting.  No luck with the Whiting, however there were heaps of Tommy Ruffs which gave us a bit of fun.  We then drove on about another 5 kms to Farm Beach.  There was a caravan park there that was packed out with vans and tents.  A short distance away was a beach covered with vehicles and trailers, and we all decided that we had a much better camp spot.  Graham joined us for lamb roast dinner in the evening.

The view from our van

Looking back towards our van from the jetty

 

Wed, 9th to Thurs, 10th March - Port Lincoln

The professional photographs were taken during the morning, both at a local park and at another setting inside a local building.  I spent the morning shopping again while the photos were being taken and then we all caught up at a local hotel for lunch. 

Jenny had the dreaded (macular degeneration) injection in her eye in the afternoon ... poor thing ... she has to have these every month and it can't be done in Streaky Bay so she has to drive to Port Lincoln every time.

Mum and Garry joined us at our caravan park later in the evening for a free sausage sizzle.  There was a film crew interviewing some people for a documentary, but we all managed to avoid the cameras.  Mum and Garry headed back to their cabin at North Shields at around 8:30pm ... or so we thought.  We received a text message the next morning to say that they had arrived back in Adelaide at 3am ... Garry had driven home all through the night.

On Thursday Jen and I shopped until noon when I had a much overdue hair appointment.  Jen headed home at around 2pm and 'the Wrecker' and I had a quiet night, getting ready to leave the following morning.

Left to right: Lee (Mum), Caryn (Grandma), Mum (Great-great Grandma) and Alexia, Jenny (Great Grandma)

Tues, 8th March - Port Lincoln

We woke to cooler temperatures (thank goodness), and misty rain.  Arno Bay is only about 2 hours north of Port Lincoln so we decided to head off, even though weather was not good for packing up or driving.  It wasn't very long though before we drove out of the rain and conditions were much better.

We arrived at the Port Lincoln Caravan Park at around 10am.  We had pre-booked our site last week as we are learning that there are a lot of people like us travelling at this time of the year and many of the parks are fully booked.  We were pleased to see that the drive-through sites that were being created late last year were now finished.  The park is tiered and the sites staggered so that everyone has a view, and the sites are nice and level.

On arrival, I rang Jenny and she said that she and Caryn were down the street shopping and that they would come and get me.  Wow ... shops ... I haven't seen many since leaving home!  Mum and Garry rang at 2pm to say they had arrived, so we all met at Caryn's house.  Early evening, Lee and Alexia came to visit and we were able to get some happy snaps of the five generations before the light faded altogether.  Jenny had organised for a professional photographer for the following morning.

Port Lincoln Caravan Park

Fri, 4th to Mon, 7th March - Arno Bay

Today we headed off fairly early and drove through Port Hughes on the way to Port Pirie, where we stopped on the side of the road for lunch.  We decided to head straight for Arno Bay which is half way down the Eyre Peninsula towards Port Lincoln.  We stayed in Arno Bay for a couple of days during our trip late last year and enjoyed ourselves immensely, so it was on our list of 're-visits'.  We were lucky to be given one of only two sites left, so we booked it until Tuesday morning.  On Tuesday we wanted to head to Port Lincoln to join Mum and Garry (from Adelaide), Jenny (from Streaky Bay) and her two girls Trish and Caryn, Caryn's daughter Lee and her brand new little baby Alexia (they all live in Port Lincoln).  With the arrival of Alexia, we now have five generations of girls in the family!  The five generations were getting together for some very important photographs.

We had a lovely time at Arno Bay with mixed but mostly windy weather.  The Wrecker managed to get onto some crabs but the squid were proving very elusive.  Fishing was a bit ordinary too, although on the Sunday Rick managed to pull up a skate and hammerhead shark in his crab net.  We met a lovely couple with their two young boys who were being home-schooled on their trip by their mother.  Young Jack would spend mornings and afternoons on the jetty with his crab net, but much to his disgust, had to 'attend' school during normal school hours.  Jack talked his Mum into cooking his crabs following a recipe he had heard about using curry and coconut milk.  Once they were cooked, Jack brought us some to taste and they were delicious!  Thanks Jack!

Monday was hot, hot, hot and really windy with major thunderstorms in the afternoon, so we stayed fairly close to the air conditioner, not venturing out much at all.  With the storms came some cooler weather and rain for most of the night.

A short walk to the Arno Bay jetty

Rick's catch

Thurs, 3rd March - Echunga

After a pleasant stay at Langhorn Creek, we rose to a lovely day and headed towards Echunga in the Adelaide Hills.  The scenery on the way was beautiful with rolling hills touched with green. Echunga is my Mum's birth place and was her home until she married our Dad.  I wanted to go to the cemetery and see where my grandparents lay.

As the cemetery is quaint and only covers a small area, we spent about an hour walking through and came across some additional, unexpected family related headstones. 

We said goodbye to Echunga and headed toward the northern outskirts of Adelaide to call in on Mum and Garry.  Not very far out of Echunga we saw a dead Koala on the side of the road ... never before have I seen so many Koalas ... dead or alive! 

Luckily Mum and Garry were home and we stayed to have a bite to eat for lunch with them.  It was only a short visit as their street is very narrow and not a good place to park an 8 metre van plus a large vehicle.

After a delicious lunch we headed off for Moonta Bay on Yorke Peninsula.  The caravan park there was heavily booked so they would only allow us to stay for one night.  What a shame ... it is a very pretty place, but one night doesn't allow enough time for you to do any sightseeing.

Wed, 2nd March - Langhorn Creek

Today turned out gloomy and cool again so we decide to travel rather than sit around in the van.  The Wrecker found a car wash at Robe, so I had a hot chocolate in the van while he did the van washing!  We drove on then to Kingston, SE where we had a nice lunch of fish and chips and Lobster Pate by the water.

As we continued on along the Coorong to Wellington, the weather cleared up and became quite warm again.  We crossed the River Murray by ferry at Wellington and camped for the night at Langhorn Creek. (Another excellent free camp spot with quite a few others already camped for the night).

Langhorn Creek campsite

Tues, 1st March, 2011 - Beachport

Another sleep in day today before heading to Beachport (near Robe).  Near Millicent we passed the site where Police and divers were trying to retrieve the body of a 29 yo woman who had been diving in a sinkhole and got into trouble.  The site was surprisingly close to the road and in a paddock ... you wouldn't even realise it was there.  Apparently the cave travels for around 10km under ground.  The lady was an accomplished diver and had been in this cave system before.

Once at the Beachport Caravan park, we caught up with the washing and general housework again.

Beachport Jetty

Our Beachport campsite

Mon, 28th of Feb - Portland

Packed up and drove along the Great Ocean Road, sightseeing along the way.  This is the third time we have travelled this road and the first time that it hasn't been blowing a gale and cold.

We arrived at around 5pm at another really good free overnight camp called 'Sawpit', quite close to Portland.  Shortly after arriving we were approached by a very young lady wanting to know if we had a foot pump.  It seems that she and her young male friend bought a blow-up mattress earlier in the day only to find that it did not come with a pump.  The two were from Belgium and were travelling from Sydney to Perth in a station wagon with only a tent for shelter.  They will be in Australia for around 6 months.  You have to admire their 'get up and go' for such a young age.

Anyway, after much mucking around with nozzles on our compressor we managed to get their bed blown up for them.

We have stayed here at Sawpit a couple of times before and this time was no different in that it rained most of the night.  The sound of water drops on the roof blown from high in the trees can be quite noisy.

Some beautiful scenery

Looking down over Portland

Our Sawpit campsite among the trees

Sun, 27th Feb - Johanna Beach

We slept in today as it is overcast again.  When we did finally surface, we decided to drive to the Cape Otway Lighthouse. It rained before we got there but cleared up again once we arrived.  We decided that Rick wouldn't be able to walk to the lighthouse (around 500 metres) or climb the stairs due to his sore knee, but we thought we might have lunch there.  We were advised that to enable us to go through to the cafe we would be required to pay $17.50 each.  Then, the bright fellow behind the counter said he wasn't even sure whether they had enough staff on duty to prepare a lunch.  We decided not to take the risk of wasting $35.00 and left feeling rather annoyed!

On the way back from the lighthouse, we spotted a koala sitting only about 10 feet off the ground in a tree right next to the road.  I got out and took a couple of photos as I don't recall ever seeing a koala in the wild before.  We continued to drive back towards Johanna Beach and came across lots of cars parked on the side of the road.  There were koalas everywhere!  Each tree had 2 or 3 in it and we must have seen around 50 in total along a short stretch of road.

We drove into a couple of other free camps on the way back to see whether they would be suitable for our next trip.  It is surprising to see just how many people are on the road and camping at this time of the year. 

Catching some z's

Sat, 26th Feb - Johanna Beach

We decided this would be a rest day - it can be a bit tiring getting up and travelling every day.  

The weather was lovely again so we sat outside and read and played games.  I took a walk along the beach alone as The Wrecker's knee is still very sore, but the March Flies got the better of me so I returned to the safety of the van!  The Wrecker keeps winning at Rummycub, so every spare minute we have, he wants to play again. 

Fri, 25th Feb - Johanna Beach

We drove over and picked up our van at around 10:30am.  Roadstar replaced the front window with a new one and put a new back leg on to replace the one that 'The Wrecker' bent on our last trip.

Our next stop along the Great Ocean Road was Johanna Beach which is just past Apollo Bay in Victoria.  It is a free camping spot with toilets, water (not drinkable) and lovely grassy areas.  It is a huge area and we were among probably 80 or so others enjoying the spot.  You can't see them in the photo below as there are many spots behind trees, etc.   I read somewhere that when the surf is not good at Bell's Beach for a competition, they move it to Johanna Beach.  The weather at this point is rather nice but the March Flies (even though it is still February) are pretty vicious.  At this stage we decide to stay here until about Monday morning.

Our campsite at Johanna Beach

Johanna Beach

Thurs, 24th Feb - Melbourne

Checked into our 'sardine tin' type cabin for the night while our van is being repaired.  We have more room in the van!!  We dropped the van off with Noel at Roadstar and headed over to Sandringham to see Hass (a friend of ours).  Sandringham is close to the beach on the southern side of Melbourne and it took us about 2 hours to drive there.  We checked out the huge DFO adjacent to Moorabbin Airport and then had a 'Maccas' for dinner before heading back to the 'sardine tin' for the night.

Wed, 23rd Feb - Melbourne

Nothing much happened today ... we skirted around the city area of Melbourne arriving at Craigieburn around 3pm and checked into the Apollo Gardens Caravan Park.  The park is closing soon, so they have increased their prices since last we were there ... trying to make as much as possible before closing we think.

Tues, 22nd Feb - Phillip Island

The morning was spent catching up on washing whilst in a park with water and power.  The Wrecker wanted to wash the Navara so he went into town to a car wash where he was greeted by a snarly woman who had obviously had a personality bi-pass.  She insisted that Rick was not allowed to take in and use his own white plastic scourer to get the bugs off and that he would scratch his car if he used it anyway.  We've only been using these scourers on cars for years ... but she knew best!!!

Anyway, once the chores were done we headed to a place called Nobbies Point.  There is a well thought out visitor's information area and a lot of man-made boardwalks around the cliff faces.  We were amazed to see small penguins under the boardwalks.  Apparently, they slowly make their way up the cliff faces to their nesting burrows.  It is moulting time, during which the penguins spend roughly three weeks on land before returning to the ocean.

We returned to Nobbies at 7:30pm to watch the famous Penguin Parade.  We sat for around 2 hours in the cold night air on a concrete seat to watch penguins come out of the ocean and make their way into the dunes around and behind us.  Again, because it is the moulting season, many of the penguins were already on land so the numbers waddling up the beach were down to around 200 each night.  Funny to watch and they were happy to wander around the boardwalks with lights and noise from people all around.   Unfortunately, videos and cameras are not allowed (sorry Lynne) but we managed to photograph a couple earlier in the day.

You can't see me ...

Beautiful views to the ocean

Mon, 21st Feb - Phillip Island

Today started well ... no battery!!  No battery means - no water pump, no toilet flusher, no lights, no auto light gas stove, etc. etc.  It seems that a certain anderson plug may not have been pushed right in to allow charging whilst driving yesterday.  Never mind ... running the motor for a short time fixed it ... another lesson learned, haha. Not having any sun for the solar panel didn't help either.

Getting out of the tight spot proved to be a bit of a challenge, but not as bad as imagined during the night.  The Wrecker maneuvered the big beast around leaving the faintest of bush scrub marks on a couple of windows.

With brekky over we drove to a place recommended on another campers blog ... Tidal River, which is further south on Wilson's Promontory. It's true ... it is a beautiful spot in a National Park.  There are only a total of 20 powered sites in the camping area and only one was left at a cost of $53 per night.  Even unpowered sites of which there are some 400 odd, were $23 per night. We decided this was a bit of a rip-off and kept going, driving on through wild wind and rain to a place called Cowes on Phillip Island.  By the time we arrived at the caravan park the sun had emerged and the world was full of joy again!

Once there we contacted Noel at Roadstar as we appear to have developed a slight leak in our front window.  Noel was very obliging and suggested we visit the Roadstar factory in Craigieburn, Melbourne as early as possible on Thursday, and they would have a look at it for us. Noel said they would like it overnight so we would need to stay somewhere in a cabin or similar for one night.

Panorama of Tidal River