Why can't I drive?

Another beautiful winter's morning greeted me as I got up at the crack of dawn and sipped my coffee whilst secretly getting annoyed that everyone else wants to sleep in when camping.

We were now on our own and I had been hanging out wanting to get into a bit of 4WD'ing so I went and booked for access to the local parks tracks.

Once again, when you have an L Plater that has already got the taste for offroad adventures, I dont really get a choice of whether I want to drive. However, once again, it is actually really satisfying seeing a youngster with a total of 30 hours of driving experience so far, learning how to navigate some tricky dirt sections, creek bed crossings, slippery tracks and downhill descents with the local widlife watching from nearby.

After a couple of hours of driving around and testing out the capabilities of my car and nerves, we headed off to Alligator Gorge which is another well known attraction with an amazing walk through the wild cliff faces and trickling water .

This walk also tested our nerves - only this time it was physical nerves that included our knees, ankles, backs and everything else that commonly hurts nowadays.

However, it was just stunning - vivid red cliff faces with some scattered burnt trees from a recent bushfire, but also a huge amount of striking gum trees that seem to grow out of sheer rock faces and an apparent lack of soil.

Sadly, our time at this gem of a location is now coming to an end

Its a true mix of bush camping yet still has enough creature comforts to make it more pleasant in the not so good weather (which admittedly we only had 18 hours of with most of that being overnight)

There was just one more stinky fire and cooking experience to tend to - this time barbecued meat direct over the coals and flames of the fire. (One of my favourites as the meat absorbs some amazing flavours from the smoke)

Sadly, tomorrow is pack up day and time to head home.

I have to say, this has been one of my favourite short stays in a long time. We will definitely be back

Pichi Richi and 4WD

Waking up on Tuesday morning to the continuing sound of light rain is good for the land, not so good for those in swags. However it turned out only 1 discovered their swag is not waterproof, with everyone else still snoring away whilst I made my first coffee for the morning.

We had predicted this wet weather, so we set off to nearby Quorn where the famous coal powered steam  tourist train Pichi Richi Railway was scheduled to run for its short 2 hour trip through the Flinders Ranges. We have all known about this for ever, but none of us had been on it before. Whilst it could be described as "just another train", it was an amazing experience to learn about the history of the train and to see some amazing scenery roll by

The end of the "downhill" leg saw us stopping at the historic town and station Woolshed Flat which was run by voulunteers specifically to serve passengers a nice array of coffee, scones with jam and cream - not that anyone in our group complained about the scones being cold, but fair to say the preference would have been for them to be warm.

We then had the return leg back to Quorn with the other side of the ranges to view, then decided what better way to top it off than visit the local Gin Distillery for a quick drink or two. This is a fairly new establishment and doesnt yet serve any food or platters, however we had learnt already that we could actually take our own stuff in, and so we did!

Whilst the rain had almost cleared up by now, it was time to head back to camp, get the fire going and start prepping the Camp Oven for yet anither spectacular WheresBarryNow dinner. Tonight was a pulled chicken with cream of chicken, carrots, onion, too much garlic and a spattering of other deliciousness. Yum.

The rain finally stopped and we enjoyed the rest of the night with small talk around the fire, a few drinks and more smoke penetrating our already stinky clothes.

As is the usual case (for me anyway) I was well and truly ready for bed by 9pm - probably due to too much to eat and too much to drink, but hey - we are camping.

Wednesday weather was beautiful. Blue skys, crisp morning weather and perfect environment for waking up early and sipping hot coffee whilst watching the local wildlife wake up.

Today we decided to go for a drive up through the local 34km Bridle Track that crosses the Ranges from Melrose to Port Germein (or close enough). Turns out that with a young 16 year old L Plater in the car, I no longer get to enjoy the fun of driving off road 😒

However, this is classed as a novice track and it turned out to be a fun drive where I actually got to enjoy the scenery a whole lot more than I normally do when driving - and she did an awesome job even with intentionally driving through every mud puddle trying to get bogged. Some of the views over the mountains and down through the valleys to the ocean were simply spectacular - no photos can show just how amazing this is.

The car was well and truly filthy now with about 80 kg of mud caked underneath the wheel arches and many other places I couldnt yet see, but it had been a great day. Our little L Plater was beaming from ear to ear with having experienced being off road for the first time, and fair to say it was time to get back and start up the smokey fire once again with tonights gormet delicacy being Lamb Shanks on a bed of mashed potato (laced with cheese, butter and more cheese of course) with some damper wrapped in foil hopefully being ready at the same time.

Turns out that without adding any yeast to the bread flour, we (ok - when I say we I obviously mean my darling wife) may have just tried cooking some of the rocks surrounding the fire -  it was about the same consistency and not anywhere as near as nice as it looked.

Some of the group left camp today to go home early, with the last of them leaving tomorrow, meaning we are on our own for the day - which is absolutely fine by me.... I am intending on tackling the parks own 4WD tracks  of which they have two of. Looking forward to that

So far - the experience of exploring Spear Creek Holiday park and its surrounds has been amazing and is highly recommended for those that like to get out and about

Arrival Day and Day 2

 July school holidays had arrived and it was finally time to get the caravan out and disappear for a few days.

This trip was a little different in that there would be no dogs and only Kayla coming with us, plus some of the usual camping buddies that we would meet at our target destination of Spear Creek - about 45 minutes NE of Pt Augusta, which is about 4 hours North from home.

I am about to be in my happy place once again

I have  read all these posts from people saying how easy it easy to go away with a caravan - just pack the food in and go.... Well after a week of me packing everything I could possibly think of, and probably being overloaded, we set off around 9:30am Sunday morning.

The trip was non eventful apart from the 70Kmh headwinds that caused me to refuel and restricted 

my already Grey Nomad maximum speed down another 10 clicks to around 85Kmh, and thankfully our camp was about 2k further inland from where the wind apparently suddenly stopped according to the location of the giant wind turbines dotting the open paddocks on the way in.

The camp location was actually amazingly set out - we were away from the general caravan sites in our own secluded location with no defined site as such, where we had our two vans, multiple firepits, and a swinging tyre for us to try and hurt ourselves on when we had drank too much. Yet we still had power, water and a communal flushing toilet hidden behind a great big gum tree in the middle of the creek bed.

Sunset was pretty spectacular, but as always, photos don't really show just how nice it was. We climbed up a nearby hill and watched the darkness creep in, before sliding our way back down to camp to sit around the fire and talk crap, have some laughs and begin the process of getting our clothes reeking of smoke for the rest of the week

Monday arrived and the weather started off with a touch of wintter sun intermingled with a cool breeze and some cloudy patches as one would expect in the middle of July.

We decided to go for a walk into the gorge at the back of the property, whoch turned into a bit of a marathon for the kids and a bit of a hike for some of us ageing adults with failing body parts. The scenery was amazing (from what we could see when lifting our eyes up from our stumbling feet) and was a great way to pass ome time before heading back to camp for a bit of Wine O'Clock time. The weather forecast was predicting a bit of a drizzle overnight which was literally going to dampen the mood a bit, but we stuck it out as long as we could, even managing to get a self saucing chocolate pudding done in the camp oven.

After stuffing ourselves full and braving the drizzle for as long as we could, it was time for bed. Its a bit of a mix between listening to the serenity of the patter of rain drops on the van roof and lying there asking myself WTF is getting flooded out .....

But at least we had some creature comforts of a heater and a heated blanket in bed (unlike the tween-agers that were braving it out in the swags in the rain 🤣🤣)

The rain is suppopsed to stop around 9:30 in the moring, so it may work out out well.