Grampians National Park

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The next day we set off with the intention of heading towards the Grampians National Park in order to do some hiking. Luckily, along thew way we were able to spot a few more of the well known rock formations including the grotto, probably my favourite, the Arch and London Bridge, now partly collapsed so that it no longer resembles the London Bridge.

We then headed straight for the Grampians. Unfortunately there had been some quite extensive flooding in the area during January. Whilst the area was now safe, as a result of the flooding some of the roads were closed. This meant that we had to take a detour along the way in order to reach Halls Gap. It was whilst we were taking one of these detours that someone, who shall remain nameless, managed to get the tyres stuck in soft ground. Luckily it was only a few minutes until someone drove past and helpfully towed us out of the ditch and we were on our way again.

We made it to Halls Gap and stayed in a very open camping ground. This was really good as the Cockatoos, Rosellas, Wallabies and Kangaroos all came into the park in the evening and you could get some good photographs of them. As we arrived pretty late into Halls gap we decided that we would hike the next day and then head as far as we could to Adelaide. With little else to do we decided to have a quick dip in the pool. This was possibly a foolhardy decision as, despite being stupidly hot outside the pool remained stupidly cool. It was also a floating graveyard for most of the nearby insect wildlife. Nevertheless a quick swim in freezing pool ended our activities for the day.

Due to the flooding our range of walks was limited, so we headed off for an easy walk to Clematis Falls, about 3km return, and then tried to extend it by walking to Chatauqua Peak which was a more difficult walk. My leg held out quite well for most of the walk but unfortunately I was defeated by a steep rock section where the swelling in my ankle meant I could not get up the hill. Steph bravely battled on to complete the walk and take a photograph at the top before coming back to meet me.

After the walk we rewarded ourselves with a lovely ice cream with some of the oddest, and greatest, flavours I have tasted. I went for Jaffa Cake flavoured Ice Cream and a scoop of something called Triple Swirl. Steph went for a classic Chocolate and also Chocolate Honey Nougat.

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