Thunderbolt's and Lightening, very, very frightening

---

QUORN & THE FLINDERS RANGES

QUORN
We continued our journey South and stopped at the ancient salt lakes which are remnants of an inland sea. We stopped off for lunch and quickly got back on the road again. This afternoon Spud has been promising that we would stop off at his Roadhouse on the way to Quorn. He has kept it up pretty well, so we half believe him! But low and behold, there it is ‘Spud’s Roadhouse’. We did let him know on our return to the bus that we had got free drink and ice cream on mentioning that we are friends of his, he plays along happily what we have done well!

We arrive into Quorn, the quaint and historical railway township nestled at the entrance to the Richman Valley. We have two nights accommodation at the historical ‘Mill’. We unload our stuff and head into the bunkhouse. We ended up in a eight bunk room with Katie and Henning, so we all get lower bunks, yeah! All of the others rush the other six bunk room (to avoid Henning me thinks!).

Charlotte has a little chat with Henning, who has excellent oral English. He turn’s out to be in IT at home and this is a two month holiday that he has worked hard over the last year to get onto. He has used all of his holiday allowance, along with a whole heap of overtime to get here. He decided on this trip after breaking up with his long term girlfriend and at 32 years old he did not know what to do. He spent the first half of this trip on an ‘Oz Experience’ type trip going up the East coast, which sort of explains his strange behaviour a bit.

We go off and do some Choppa, Choppa for us, then Charlotte and Katie help out the guide from the other group too (the had not quite done enough!). Tonight we have a BBQ of Camel sausage, Emu Patties and Kangaroo steaks, along with the choppa, choppa salad. Tonight as they have loads of sofa’s in the lounge, and we are all exhausted from the travelling we opt out of the Saturday night village pub experience and settle down in front of the TV, while Liam sorts out for us to watch Austin Powers 1 from his MP3 player. As we head off to bed Toni and Susi boots stay up watching TV and chatting until 3 or 4 am!

Day 5 in the Big Brother house! Well Henning has been up all night walking around, so when he goes out for breakfast Katie jumps in the shower, then Liam and Charlotte with 5 minutes to spare, just as Charlotte is doing her make up and Liam is getting on the bus, Henning run’s in the shower and comes running out with only his hand holding the towel over his little soldier. Charlotte and the whole of the bus (as the door to the dorm was wide open) got quite a view. Charlotte laughed and told him to cover up! Which he soon did, but made for plenty of gossip in the next couple of day’s, how strange!

Today we go to the magical ‘Flinders Ranges’ which has been recognised as one of Australia’s National Landscapes. Wilpena Pound is a natural amphitheatre located in a huge stone crater. We spent the morning hiking around and exploring its wonder! We all walked as far as the abandoned farm, where Charlotte and Katie waited in the shade of the Eucalyptus trees whilst the rest of the group went up to the look out.

It did not seem very high up from where we sat, but we learnt our lesson with Heart attack hill and stayed put! We soon saw Toni coming back on her own. It was not the look out that we could see, it was much further up and along! Ha ha, good move then! Liam had a great time, although Henning was doing his now normal weird shit of trying to take his own photo of himself with the scenery, even though he was with a group of people who would all have happily taken a couple of pictures of him!

As we were heading back along the alternative route and were crossing over the dried out river bed we spotted a couple of Kangaroos in the shade. We were taking photo’s of a couple of strange looking wasps mating when Henning came pounding back down the hill, scaring them off!, exclaiming that he had lost his hat. Luckily he soon caught up with Susi boots and Ueli had picked it up, so happy days!

When we arrived back to camp and had done a bit of Choppa, Choppa for the Chicken burgers, Charlotte sloped off to get a can of Sprite from the vending machine, to find that five came out, yeah! Great luck. She shared them around with Liam, Spud, Ueli (who had lent her 10c, great return!) and Gitte. After lunch We walked down to the shop and brought a couple of ice creams whilst the rest of the group Washa, Washa. They came and picked us up when they had finished and we were on our way again.

We could not got to Yourambulla to see the cave paintings as the walk was closed for renovation, so we headed out to the Kanyaka Homestead, a deserted sheep farm, where we learnt about the hardships of sheep farming in the 1800’s. We visited the graveyard and saw what short lives they all had.

As we travelled back to Quorn we took the opportunity to try and spot the shy and elusive Yellow footed Rock Wallaby on a quite stroll through peaceful Warren Gorge. Unfortunately the best we could do was find a Euro a mix between a Kangaroo and a Wallaby.

Just as we were leaving the heavens opened and the rain came pouring down! There was thunder and lightening every where! There goes our plans for a nice swim on our return! We chilled out on our beds for a bit and let the others do a bit of Choppa, Choppa for tonight as we read our books. Our plan was to do the Washa, Washa. However they decided to cook for both groups staying tonight and the other group could do the washing up! So lucky us! Mind you we have done extra, so it all works out well in the end.

In the mean time whilst enjoying a beer with the boy’s Charlotte was called to the side by Toni. Katie was in tears and could not face going back into our room for the night with Henning in there. Apparently this morning before we got up, (Henning had been up and down all night walking around! He does not sleep well, we heard him up and down in the cave to!) Henning had seen that she was awake and asked her in German to jump into his bed if she could not sleep. Now had he said that to Charlotte or Toni they would have jumped right in and scared the life out of him! However poor Katie was scared. She did not want to remain in the same room as him, especially if people could not understand him making offensive comments!
Apparently he had made the same sort of comment’s to both Dorte and her friend (both also quite and shy).

Toni had a plan that we would move her into there tiny room, if we moved the beds slightly we could plonk her mattress in the middle and all would be good. As we made ready to do the deed and move the mattress Liam clicked on and turned Henning so he did not realise what we were up to! This saved the questions until later. It was actually quite comical Little Katie with her bag’s and Charlotte and Toni with the Mattress! Katie was happy, so we went off to dinner.

The other group do not get back until late, so it is a good job we have cooked! We were starving! It was the best Lamb Thai curry with rice! Yummy. We even got pudding of baked Apricot, biscuit and coco pops thing with custard. Because of the thunder storm the electricity was a bit hit and miss, so we had a romantic meal for twenty one people by candle light. The other group headed to the local pub for a lock in and we sat in the lounge and watched Austin Powers 2 and Batman Begins. We headed off to bed, but heard Susi boot’s were up all night again. This is looking like the real thing! Spud had explained that the next day was a really hard walk up a mountain, then back down again. Beautiful views but a hard long walk. Charlotte, Katie, Toni and Gitte opted for a lay in and a walk around town, or chilling in the lounge to a film. The others had to be up and packed and on the bus by 8am.


When it came time for Henning to go back, Charlotte walked him as we had to lock the door behind him, due to hearing people outside last night. He did ask about the lack of a mattress, so she explained as clearly as she could how Katie felt and what he had done to upset her without trying to be judgemental. He accepted this and agreed to stay away from her for the rest of the trip, though he did not quite understand why she had got upset as he could not remember saying anything offensive. Maybe he just does not realise how to act around women.


The plan worked well as Henning was up early, so we assumed that he had showered before breakfast, so Liam hopped in and was read to go. Just as Charlotte was going to pop in the shower, so much for the lay in, She is too used to the early start’s now!, Henning jump’s in, literally one minute before they are due to leave! No more nudity now Henning! Tee Hee! As Charlotte is showering she hears him inform Spud that she is being slow and we should wait as I am still in the shower!! Spud informs him that actually I am staying behind, but thanks anyway! The girls decamp to the lounge and as Charlotte has gotten hold of the MP4 player we have some breakfast and sit there snoozing away to fight club! It finishes just before the others come back, so we make good and prepare the lunch for them, so we don’t look too lazy.

The climb itself wasn’t too bad as the weather was a little over cast and the temperature was still comfortable (as best it can be for Oz). As we walked we split off in to our own little groups as usual, Spud and Liam in front, Dorte and friend not to far behind, Henning on his own followed by Suzie Boots. I’m glad Chris was there as the route was not clearly marked out so we would have got lost if he had left us to it. A gentle slope that meandered up Dutchman Stern, through the flora and fungi with brilliant views of Quorn. As we reach the top the cloud begins to break to reveal a fantastic panorama.

We ca see 100km, we’re told all the way to the outback, and the train tracks into Port Augusta. “The visitors book!” Spud exclaims. We all look at him like he has some strange variant of turrets, then he rummages under some rocks and pulls out a plastic pipe which sure enough contains the visitors book, we all sit down and sign it (Spud leaves a message for the next tour guide). Then what goes up must come down, not as tough as the climb up but the sun is shining now so very much hotter. We reach the bus in the same order we got to the top in (Suzie boots last again, something must be distracting them. Snigger, snigger) back to Quorn to our lunch freshly prepared by the girls, they are good to us.

Burrito style mince in wraps with salad, yummy, even Liam is starting to eat some Salad! Don’t tell him I told you! Back on the bus and a couple of hours to Adelaide. En route we stopped at a couple of photo points, one being a Murray town sign for Charlotte and a 60 sign for Liam (to make his mums birthday card with, it’s her 60th this year, while we are away!). Charlotte got everyone going exchanging e-mail/Facebook addresses. Quite clever really as she wrote them all on one bit of paper, then everyone photographed it! Genius! We also stopped at a wine tasting place and happily tried there best vintages, purchasing a couple of bottles of very nice rose (see picture of Charlotte hugging the bottles) for consumption later, not like us we know, but it was lovely at the tasting (we got the tasting fee back too!).

Driving into town we spotted a couple of huge blow up Astronauts’ one wearing a pink tutu, that must be the “Vin Diesel one “ Spud exclaims! We have no idea why they are there, but spot one they are pointing to at the top of a building! It turns out they are the symbol of the Adelaide Fringe which is on in town at the moment.

Spud dropped everyone at the YHA, then dropped us at our hostel “Annie’s Place”, we had to stay here as it is the name of Liam‘s god daughter!. We checked in, had a well deserved shower, changed into jean’s and jumpers (which was lovely as it is quite cool in Adelaide) then went back up to the restaurant next to the YHA where Spud had booked us in for a goodbye meal.

We had a lovely set meal, we both had a Chicken schnitzel, not as good as the groups choppa, choppa, but I suppose it will do! Spud’s friend, another guide, joined us for dinner and we all headed out after for a couple of beers. We went to an old pub close to our hostel which was hosting Billy Bob’s BBQ, which is an open mic night. As it was the Adelaide fringe it was full of people that looked like they should be in Camden. Great fun and very bohemian. We said a very sad farewell to everyone at the end of the night. Except for Katie, who could not get rid of for another week or so!

---