Day 29 - Beaches, Lighthouses and Australian Marsupials

Aussie prayer flags

Life on the road boils down to a few necessities: fuel, food, maps and washing the clothes once a week.

Today was the day when we both ran out of undies and the days of turning them inside out and hoping it's not hot and not indoors, are behind us. Clean undies and clean sox are just one thing we won't do without. So, with no laundry at our dream camp beside the lagoon, it was a matters of splitting the load and taking to the twin sinks in the toilet block and a serious hour or so of hand washing.

Clothes on the line strung between two Red Gums, clothes on the hangers on the van and my undies strung along the guy ropes like some form of Aussie prayer flags and the job was done. The line between the gums was enhanced by a makeshift prop (the antenna mast) lashed to the line halfway along.

So thanks to Sue's planning, we were off to see the wizards, the wonderful wizards of KI. Kingscote for some bits and pieces, to send a card to a new arrival - welcome Emma Joy Frazer - and to plan our next two days.

As the day was already half done, we went to south to Pennington Bay, on the southern coast where KI is at its narrowest. Locals had recommended it. A nondescript sign and a dirt road were the only recommendation in situ but didn't they turn out to be underwhelming in the scheme of things. The dirt road ended exposing a double beach, split by rocky outcrops that had been honeycombed by wave action and salt air exposure. Any weed under the surface started way out beyond the breakers, such that big two metre wave cracked in one after the other through brilliant light blue water. The sand was near white and not a foot print to be seen until we did what no one else seemed to want to do from the car park and ventured down the wooden staircase to the sand.

Pennington Bay

If it was a restaurant, it would have had the Michelin maximum and Sue was in bare feet immediately, trousers rolled up and splashing through the water's edge until knee deep. This girl comes alive by the ocean. It's as though it's a charging station for her soul and within seconds of its touch, she has stripped away years and is that little Yamba nipperette again, all wondrous and amazed like a kid from the western districts feeling its magic embrace for the first time. For the next half hour I watched, warmed by her joy and freedom.

We eventually ate lunch in this lovers' rendezvous of ours, spiced by sea spray and memories of other such delicious moments. The English Channeled beaches of northern France came to mind, save for the lack of rounded, near fist sized stones which act as a poor substitute for the soft footfalls of Australian sand. It was the cliffs that sparked the memory and hid other visitors from view, high above and looking down to miss us, hidden on the seas's side of the mid beach rockscape.

This hour alone might have been the highlights of our six weeks of escape.

More was to compete with it.

After lunch, we motored toward Penshaw, passing through it and to the eastern most points of the island. Before we could get to Chapman River, along the road to Cape Willoughby, we were invited to follow a grader along a section of road under improvement. They were right: it was underimproved! Slushy from watering, lose from grading and full of moving gravel, we slid from side to side, even in low range and at less than 20kms/hr but the Forester maintained its grace under pressure.

The Chapman River was another delight, it's shallows running just behind a vegetated sand dune

Chapman River

immediately behind the breakers pounding away on the beach. Stands of tea trees stood in soft soil, in some places muddy from recent inundation and gave way to sandy banks and the warm tea coloured water of such places. The leaves of the tea trees provide the stain. It was quiet except for birds and the distant surf and another wonderful grab in our day.

A few kilometres up the road and down another was the Chapman River Estate - a rather grand name for a rather lovely, low key and definitely boutique cellar door. The owner had art hanging on the walls - the best of it her own - and the eclectic furnishings gave the place a sense of originality that is refreshing in these days of bland marketing. We sampled three of the reds and came away with two of them. Coffee on the metal outdoor settings which can be obtained cheaply at Bunnings but not in the vivid primary colours we saw and a handful of second hand, well thumbed books for a pittance. It was an experience recommended by my brother and as usual, an excellent suggestion.

Further down a deteriorating road, we crested a hill and the road, sharply defined on either side by lines of unbroken trees, led directly down a steep slope to the Cape Willoughby lighthouse, standing out in stark reliefs of red and white against the blue ocean beyond. It was stunning. As we drew closer, so was the newly constructed cafe overlooking Moncreif Bay and settling into its landscape as though Frank Lloyd Wright had designed it himself.

Cape Willoughby Lighthouse and
whale bones

The lighthouse is South Australia's oldest, officially opened in 1852 and placed there to provide safe journeys for shipping moving through the Backstairs Passage from the east, to Adelaide. Like the original keepers cottages, it is built from limestone and granite quarried locally. The other function it continues to provide is as a critical station in predicting South Australia's weather. The weather records for the lighthouse date back to 1881' although these days, a solar panel powers a completely automated system which records and reports without human involvement.

Short walks are available from the lighthouse but two signs discouraged me. "Snakes live here" and "Magpies nesting along this walk" were definitely in the too much information bracket for me. The views are spectacular from this exposed place on KI's most easterly point.

Avoiding the roadworks, we drove cross country soon after  travelling along the Wilson River Road, which crosses - you guessed it - the Wilson River and the East West Road, which goes from east to west. In the process, we crossed the North South Road at right angles. They keep the nomenclature simple down here.

Driving past our digs, we went the few extra kilometres to Emu Bay, another of the quiet little villages which cling to the shoreline around a small bay of white sand and gentle waves rolling in agelessly. After taking in the pelicans at the wharf and asking those with rods and glum faces the rather rude question on how the fishing was, the rather ominous retorts left us glad we were not so afflicted to like either fishing or golf: two pastimes for the addicted.

Above the wharf, along a grassy slope, we discover an echidna wandering about like some dementia afflicted old man, shouting for insects. His stumpy legs would waddle him along like as though in need of knee reconstructions, until he found something of interest, where upon he would dig furiously and thrust his snout deep into the ground and leg his long, sticky tongue investigate. What a great end to an already sensorially extreme day.

Salmon pasta with fresh mint from the herb garden growing in an old box trailer back at Discovery Bay, red wine and a look through today's photos was a final reminder of our great fortune to have each other and to still be doing that which has so passionately burned in us for so long.

Day 28 - Kangaroo Island

Our trip to Kangaroo Island, which lies off the South Australian coast and acts as a guardian of the Gulf f St Vincent, began with the rather short leg to Cape Jervis. From our spot at Trig Campground in Deep Creek Conservation Park, it was less than twenty kilometres to the thriving metropolis come boring little squat of a village that is Cape Jervis.

As you head down the hill into Cape Jervis, there is usual sense of anticipation of what a new place might hold. This was soon abated when we stopped at the local hotel/post office/general store/café/fast food joint/petrol station and all in the space of a short, taciturn conversation with the two legged charm bracelet that owns, runs and dispenses local homilies.

“What might I expect to see in Cape Jervis?” says I.

“Nothin’. This is about it. It’s a fishing village ruined by tourists who ask questions.”

“And if I wanted a coffee?” I continued, undeterred by our initial tête-à-tête.

“You’d be out of luck.”

At that point, our conversation - a loose and rather exaggerated description - was interrupted by an elderly gent showing signs of desperation. Excusing himself, he asked where he might find the toilet.

“Down at the Sea Link terminal or in Victor Harbour,” came the instant, practiced and unsympathetic reply.

To think, a few minutes earlier, as we stood at the scenic lookout which took in views across the Backstairs Passage to KI - Sue’s slant on localism - the lighthouse and the Sea Link terminal, we had imagined there wasn’t much to Cape Jervis. It turns out there was even less.

We almost swung passage on the ten o’clock boat but were happy to wait our turn for the one pm passage which we had booked. The ferry terminal was like most you find around the world - bad coffee, efficient counter service, rows of plastic moulded chairs, garish carpet and a man talking about how he catches snakes with a bent piece of wire and egg slice. The time was well spent with Sue planning where we would go and me reporting where we had been.

All those years of reversing box trailers

Before we left, I impressed myself (if no one else) by reversing the trailer and car forty metres down a slope, across the ramp and into a tight lane beside a particularly smelly cattle truck.

The trip across was uneventful, although at one stage an alarm went off and several staff members went running in several directions. As an international traveller well used to ferry crossing, I wasn’t bothered, probably because I was on deck taking photos at the time and missed the event. The bloke behind us went green and tried to wallpaper cool over his sea sickness. Tried. We just laughed at things and people in that crass, supercilious fashion that superior intellects do, only in our case it was because we are prats.

Once back on land that stayed still and wasn’t covered in the bloke behind us’ vomit, we stopped at the information centre and then went on a few kms to Brown Beach for another spectacular lunch spot.

We reached our digs about four pm and it must be said, first impressions did not bode well. Reception was a farmhouse and what we took to be the campgrounds were mown slopes above a fairly pretty inland lagoon. However, the service was very friendly and we were soon to discover our impressions were poor, but then our training was in teaching, not impressions.

The campground of Discovery Lagoon, was on the other side of the water and proved to be a delight. The toilet block and the camp kitchen are both new constructions but covered in what appears to be old corrugated iron. It is, in fact, iron that has been made to look aged. Solar panels power LED external and internal lighting and hot water showers. The toilets are tiled throughout and include large cubicles, lockable boxes in which to recharge phones, laptops, ipads, cameras etc and framed photographs. The ladies is even nicer!

The camp kitchen has two large gas bbq plates, new benches and chairs and is walled in at one end against the prevailing breeze, with a large bellied enclosed wood burning heater. Wood is chopped and stacked ready for use and another pile is kept in a dry box outside. Two large whiteboards are covered in guests comments.

Gardens and pathways have been established with drought tolerant plantings and other neat, farm humoured innovations. An old, rusted box trailer with flat tyres has been filled with soil and grows herbs for campers to include in their cooking. The sites are bush sites and although some are marked, the owner encouraged us to park anywhere except in the lagoon!

About half an hour after we set up, she dropped by to see if we needed anything, to give us a weather report and apologised again for the lack of a laundry which “hubby is hoping to make a start on this weekend”. All this and it is located on the shore of a lagoon rich with water birds and drowned red gums.

$25 dollars a night and we are the only ones in camp. Are you kidding me?

Livin' the dream

I spent the sunset taking photos and then we ate our steak and salad, supported by a pleasant red wine and warmed by the firebox. Somewhere in there, we Skyped Sarah in Greece for her 31^st birthday. Who needs the old days?

At dusk, kookaburras called an invitation to the evening, handing over to the night crew who were already warming up in the dead red gums in the lagoon.

Pleasant? What do you think?