Advertisement
Published: August 28th 2012
Edit Blog Post
Esperance to Streaky Bay South Australia via the Nullarbor We got away from Esperance early morning and headed for Caiguna Roadhouse our first overnight stop.
Our morning tea and fuel stop was at Norseman just at the start of the Nullarbor. On our way through these little towns I was noticing some really strange names - one of the first was ”Gibson Soak” the next was” Grass Patch” and the funniest was “Salmon Gums”.
Our next fuel stop was some roadhouse that I can’t remember the name of (Jim – Balladonia). We stopped there fuelled up and had some lunch in our vans. Jane had made Alan’s lunch then poured him a pineapple juice. He immediately knocked it over so Jane cleaned that up and poured him another and straight away he knocked that one over. “Not happy Jane” she said you can forgive one but TWO.
A dear lady travelling on her own asked Jim for directions to the next caravan park, that was Caiguna and she’s still with us.
She is an Italian Lady, she left Sydney 8 weeks ago to
travel around OZ on her own in a little car with a homemade camper on a trailer that she is towing. Some one backed into it so she can’t sleep in it anymore as she cannot lock it now. She is sleeping in her car now and it’s been so cold. Anyway she loves us so she’s staying with us.
The Nullarbor isn’t as bad as we thought it was going to be, not a lot of changing scenery though.
After arriving in Caiguna for our first night on the Nullarbor, I remembered my Dad saying he hitch-hiked across in the 70’s. “Good on you Dad” I wouldn’t want to do that.
We slept OK at Caiguna not too much road noise.
Next day we headed east again for our next overnight on the Nullarbor. For Jim and I it was a free camp on the rugged Southern Ocean. We found an awesome place right on top the cliffs. Took lots of photos, lit a campfire and hoped neither of us did any sleep walking that night. Jim cooked our dinner on the campfire T-bone steaks, chips and marshmallows to finish. Jim started the generator up
so we could put our electric blankets on. They warmed our bed for 3 hours and with our diesel heater we were very toasty. The others went onto the Nullarbor roadhouse. Wayne said it was a bit noisy there overnight. We were very happy with our overnight stop.
The next morning we were up dressed and off and arrived to catch up with the others before another long drive but we got there and they had only just got out of bed they weren’t expecting us for another hour, so we carried on to the next roadhouse where we fuelled up and had a coffee and some vegemite toast. That’s where the others caught up with us including Gianna - our new best friend. She says that she is the little puppy-dog following along behind.
The coastline at the great Australia bight is awesome.
After a border check at Ceduna we carried on to Streaky Bay. We had decided to book ahead and were able to get beachfront sites. The very best we have had yet - but again the weather is crap!! Raining and freezing cold.
Streaky Bay Well it’s catch up time again I’m blogging and Jim is lying on the bed reading” Fifty Shades of Grey “ I think he wants to know what all the fuss is about.
We spent a great evening at the Streaky bay hotel, pig on the spit and the All Blacks were playing the Wallabies in the Bledisloe cup, great outcome we all left there happy.
The guy organising the pig on the spit was a Maori born in OZ but very much a Kiwi at heart.
We bought some Streaky bay oysters - they were ok but we have had better.
We had a nice time in Streaky bay our camp sites were right on the waters edge the weather didn’t start out to well but we did have some sunny moments.
We left Streaky bay on the Sunday and headed for Port Lincoln with a stop for lunch at Coffin Bay, all these places a really beautiful and one day would like to return to them. We do like South Australia - some of the really old homes are awesome.
On our
way to Coffin bay we came across this quaint little roadside stall that sold fresh bread, just had a sliding glass door and an honesty box, we bought lovely cobb bread some bread rolls and sticky buns, it was amazing. See photos.
We couldn’t buy any Coffin bay oysters in Coffin bay because it was Sunday, Damn.
Continued onto Port Lincoln - checked into a really nice van park on the waters edge, we only had one night there. The Hartner’s and Leck’s left early for Port Augusta and Jim and I stayed on in Port Lincoln for a few hours as Jim had booked our car in for another service it was done in a couple of hours. We had breakfast in a really nice café on the waterfront before picking up the car, then we called into a seafood wholesalers and bought 5 dozen Coffin Bay oysters $7 a dozen, some prawns, King Charles whiting, smoked salmon, and some smoked Kingfish.
Off we set to catch up with the others in Port Augusta, and this is where our around Australia trip has now taken on a new route.
We are now heading north as
we are all feeling the cold and want to get back to QLD.
We have now included Broken Hill in the trip, I have always wanted to visit Broken Hill so this has worked out well.
Years ago we went to the Sunshine Coast and bought a Kim Hart (Son of Pro Hart) painting. While there I discovered Howard William Steer art - he is famous for his humerous flying Doctor art which I love - so a visit to his gallery in Broken Hill will be a must - also the Pro Hart gallery.
Now some boy stuff from Jim:
It is common knowledge that the prevailing winds on the Nullarbor are from the west. This is why most people circumnavigating Australia usually go anti-clockwise so they get as much help from the wind as possible. This saves fuel and allows a higher cruising speed.
This proved to be the case as on days when we had a tail wind fuel consumption was less than 20 L/100km and speed was easily maintained at around 100kph. Whereas when we had head winds as we did from Port Lincoln to Port Augusta and then
on to Broken Hill fuel consumption was 23.7 L/100km and it was a struggle to keep speed up at 90kph.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.157s; Tpl: 0.023s; cc: 9; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0721s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Jan Chalker
non-member comment
glad you are having a ball, when are you planning on getting home?. we plan to spend some time in Streaky Bay fishing for the King George whiting so hope to bring some home. Getting a bit sick of always being on the run so will be glad to put out the anchor for a little while. Heading over the Nullarbor in a week or two.