Port Lincoln And The National Park

Port Lincoln and the National Park, the very bottom of the Eyre Peninsula.

Needing to stock up meant the trip to the supermarket and in between going to the parks place to pick up a key and get the camping site organized.

Heading out to the Peninsula was a good road, in fact paved to within 6 km of our designated camp but it does cost $12 AU per day to drive in there plus your camp site fees, good to see that money being put back in there.

Our site like all are stone based lime so harder than taking a back wheel off a Ural, luckily there were some rock 200-400 in size which we could use a gravity pegs and I tried banging ours in and they just laughed at me.     

Again we tried fishing but to no avail, only small bites.

Our next day lead us to the 5 star rated Memory Bay, a good bit of paved road then off onto sandy, rutted and potholes so great fun.

The bay is beautiful and there are only 5 sites available and it would seem you have to book well in advance…way longer lead time than we even knew about it so no chance to stay just day visit.

We did a bit of fishing, spectacular beach, beautiful weather we had a mint day out.

On our way again we were heading north west up the western side of Eyre Peninsula toward Coffin Bay, this was very touristy and spendie as expected.

From Coffin Bay heading north we were going to stop for a coffee somewhere up the coast on the way to Elliston, well that idea wasn’t great even tho I am an ideas man as there is nothing except the road.

Oh well, saved $12 bucks.

Elliston we planned to stay two nights so Ellen could continue with her work, arriving late in the day meant that night was pretty much already shot.

Ellen did her accounting thing and I attempted squidding, not success other than donating gear to the sea.

We booked another night as we really liked the place having a pub, bakery and coulas ladies and gents running the camp.

Our last day we took time out and played tourist so Ellen could see the place, she did do some work and I had a BIG sortout of our fishing kit, we had a spare line left over and gave it to the lady at the camp who in turn gave it to some kids who bought other fishing gear from her….they were over the moon at getting the freebee line.

On our way out from Elliston we did the great ocean tourist drive which encompasses works of art spread out along the coast drive.

Time to get our rocks off.

Cummins...The Dunnie...Fair Dinkum...The Shitter.

 The Dunnie…close to the bottom….of Eyre Peninsula.

Argh the peace and serenity of having a crap in the worlds flashiest dunnie, Michael Caton (The Castle) would be very proud if this, it won a world title …tell em he’s dreamin …but nah fair dinkum it is a ripper shitter.

So, to say Ozzies are full of shit or scared to show their talent is not fair, not fear and no fare as they have the perfect place to go, being a kiwi in construction I can appreciate this crappy masterpiece of engineering excellence.

Now that the shenanigans and insults have concluded (had to jam them in) this toilet is a work of art, literally.

With ceramics galore you have to look close, then hard and again to note and take in the detail which has been very well thought out hence their prize winning shitter.

Even the doors to the cubicles have names, the wall has 3D art and it is extremely well done.  

From travellers with suitcases, a dog cocking its leg and mirrors from mosaics and glass the detail is amazing.

The dog pissin on the wall

Ouwh the town is nice too and the bakery was brilliant food and very reasonably priced.

All in all for a mid country eyre peninsula town with a ripper shitter we came away with a gut full of bakery goodies.

Worthy, …now Port Lincoln and the National Park.    

...Now To Make Some Ground

Now to make some ground, previously in a friends Landcruiser we have done the York Peninsula, we did stop in at Port Germain but didn’t stay so this seemed to be a good option.

 First off before bailing off from Adelaide we met up with Norm for a coffee at the Café in our camp ground, we met Norm at the VARSTy Ural gathering at Healesville and is an old hand at Urals so a wealth of information and a good bastard as well, actually somehow…and I can’t remember Sue (Norms good lady) gave us a cork, we decided it would look good on Скиппи…so it is mounted on the front. 

Heading off again it was easy to navigate through Adelaide but like every city it is a long time to get out of it, I am very happy to say that with the oil cooler onboard now Скиппи was coffing and farting like she was due to heat even tho the Adelaide day was hotter.

Taking the B roads and some other dodgy back roads we arrived all in good time to have a leg stretch out on the 1.6 km long jetty.

A good nights sleep and we were away to Port Augusta and beyond ending up in Whayalla for a coupla nights as Ellen needed to get some work done.

Whayalla is famous for its circular jetty which look great lit up at night, I did some fishing but to no avail we had chops instead.

 While in Whayalla…UDF, this time a dude rocks up and says a mate of his just bought one of these things…it’s 2wd, I said yeap same as this, he it has reverse too, again, yeap me too so he rings his mate and they organize to come to the park we were staying at….Uralchatter again.

Ellens work partly done we decided to rip inland a bit to a place called Kimba which is on the main western trunk line to the Nullabor.

It was as well we had bought some food as the town was closed….so NO supplies whatsoever, we had enough but not enough for another day which meant we moved on and went further down to the coast again, we had planned a bush camp stop but we pulled in to Port Neill which got our attention, very nice place and Ellen set done to do more work. 

Again I tried fishing and with only minimal luck, only one decent fish was pulled up for the day.

I got chatting with some locals and they convinced us to go through Cummins, the town that won an international award for the flashed dunny and they have a mint café.

Taking good local advice we made our way through to Cummins via a bad condition gravel road, we let our tires down to 16 PSI in order to combat the rough road which meant we didn’t lose any fillings. 

Some corrugations big enough that we were forced down to first gear at snail pace.

Adelaide

Adelaide…..

Forecast for showers.

Rain…this is actually what came, BOM right on the money again LOL.

The 171 bus was 10 mins walk from the camp ground and took us straight into the town centre.

Our mission was to sample the good fud of Adelaide and if, maybe, by chance, if possible, in the unlikely event, could be or maybe geta new set of boots for Ellen. Her shoes she bought last year in Vladivostok were falling apart quicker than a leper on a pogo stick.

On our way into town it started bucketing down, on arrival it had backed off to pouring.

Finding our way around we were going to take the free inner city bus for tourists for a hoon but with the rain etc we decided to wait till the next day.

That following day we shuffled into town and spent the whole day there, icecreams, coffee and Turkish for dinner….but with the real treat in between.

Ellen needed new boots so we made a B Line to the outdoor shops first, the first two didn’t have anything much, our last try was at a store which was going out of shoes.

On arrival they actually had La Sportiva (our fav) and because they were going out of shoes they had nearly 50% off…..yeah…50% of a dutchie and 100% of a chiwi we were in with a grin…assuming they had our size left.

Well, for the first time in history both Ellen and mine were there AND on sale…couldn’t believe it.

Ellen got hers and said I would be mad not to get some for me, firstly I could them and secondly they were nearly half price and mine are starting to fail…but still have some life left in them, anyway, yeap…don’t you ever let a chance go by (Bob Hudson).

By dem boots

Feeling pretty coul having got new boots we were as flash and Michael Jackson and on our way.

The fun and sight seeing continued in town with the beautiful buildings of yesteryear.

The central mall was coul with artworks and a nice vibe.

The old buildings were done properly and still stand in full glory

Street art murals are everywhere and well done as well as living art and ...things.

And no city is complete without Chinatown. 

Sticking around in town till later to see some night life, bars and restaurants we finally exited home before the last bus finished.

All in all Adelaide was very cool for a city and of course we did well from it too.

Mt Gambier, Bush Camp and Adelaide The Beginning

With Mt Gambier done and dusted we headed west toward Adelaide, Malcolm Howden from our Wanaka Motorcycle Club was on his way down so we were trying to meet up with him as he travelled down to see the rest of the WMC muppets over here having a ride.

We went via a wind farm which was cool and ducked it and out of the coast on our way up.

Ducking and diving in and out of the coast took us to some interesting spots.

 

We managed to make a ronde Vue at Robe and as it happened we stopped straight opposite a

bakery to have lunch.

A short wait and Malcolm turned up with his new (to him) Husky 701 which is a cool piece of kit. (mate you coulda done your hair for the occasion)

 

A good yarn and catchup we were on our way again, the bike still misbehaving slightly so again we ran her dry this time with another fresh load of 98 she was finally back normal...as normal as a Ural goes anyway.

Our next leg took us on a barge ride then up to The Bridges at the bottom of the Murray River, lunch stop and dress up as it was cold and to recharge the micro transducer silicon enhancer which adds another 50 hp to the bike 😆

On to our camp which was semi wild with composting toilets, shower powered by 12 volt pump and solar etc with a groovy kitchen and a very cool owner who involved everyone in real person chats etc.

While here we visited an almost waterfall.

Adelaide in our sights were aimed for a camp ground near the city center, so many people said we must go for the food so it was game on for good tucker.

Navigating into town was almost too easy with Adelaide taking the cake for the easiest city to get into.

Leaving GOR And Off To Mt Gambier

Sawpit freecamp, pretty cool place and some nice walks out to Whaler View Point.

Campfire cooking nothing beats it.

Ellen did have to have a chat to a coupla young punks about loud music again and they we good enough to turn it down ..however it was after 11.00.pm.

A wet start to pack up then Mt Gambier was on the hit list, getting to the caravan park near the centre of town we set up and dried out, Скиппи was running like bag of rusty spanners and wouldn’t idle and was backfiring like an old Ural…oh yeah she is that right.

We fitted new spark plugs, no difference, then proceeded to put in a Vodka mixture of injector clean and mentholated spirits, both would help in cleaning the injectors and mopping up any water.

Not sure which it was but we ran the tank from full until the bike stopped running, with a full gullet of 98 octane Vodka she was back running smoother and idling like an old Ural…oh yeah she is that’s right.

So it would seem we got a dud batch of 98 fuel and this gave her the guts ache.

With full HP being restored we were off like a robbers dog on three legs.

While in Mt Gambier we experienced the Centenary Tower and also the sinkholes, these were incredible with the way they were formed and how it was shown in the free movie in the info centre, very very worthwhile for geotechnical heads .

From the movie.

From the movie.

The blue lake.

The Centenary Tower

Sink hole

Inside the sink holes.

 As a treat we hadn’t been out to tea for a while so we took advantage of the offerings from Wild Ginger Thai, a great feast was had.

I like Ellens new phone camera make me look slimmer 😐

N o i c e fud

 

The end.