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This is how it starts, a camper and a beach. Next a beard and unwashed hair. Soon, tie-dye, dreds and Jesus sandals. Our little camper has it all and a bag of potato chips! After stocking up the fridge with fruit and veg (we will be eating healthily for the next 8 days) we made directly for Palm Beach - where Home and Away is made. Just 20 km out of Sydney, this is by far the most beautiful beach around and even has Summer Bay Surf Club. A great place to spend our first night free camping; that just means sleeping by the side of the road like pikies, or Orrs - how long did you lot live in a caravan for?
We rose extremely early in the morning for the first leg of the journey to Adelaide... the 850 km drive to Melbourne. This was when the fun really started. Australians are up in arms about the price of fuel over here because it has risen from about $1 per litre to $1.40ish in the last 5 or 6 months. It's only 70p per litre! They should try filling up in the UK. Then they'd be thinking twice
before hooning around in 3.5 litre V6 saloons! Still, over these kind of distances the fuel costs do add up and when we arrived in Mels after 13 hours on the road we had learnt alot about fuel conservation, not to mention aminal preservation. I've never seen so much road kill and I'm not talking hedgehogs over here. Kangaroos and wombats are pretty hefty customers and must make a hell of a dent in a bumper. Neverthless, the roadside looks like the aftermath of some kind of marsupial holocaust. No wonder the 3.5 litre V6 saloons all have enormous kangaroo bars on the front. We did some more free camping in Mels - in the car park of a hostel. We also used their showers, internet, kitchen, in fact, when they saw Andrew helping himself to the free breakfast they must have just assumed we were staying there because surely no-one would take the piss that much. This is too easy. Well, with things not panning out in Melbourne as we thought we headed for Adelaide via the Great Ocean Road again. Maybe we would get better weather this time........
The Great Ocean Road is what this camper stuff
is all about. The plan was to drive this incredible surf-side road all the way to Adelaide stopping at beautiful beaches and taking in historic fishing villages along the way. Then we were reminded that it is winter here. Oh. In winter it rains, much like it does in the UK, and camping is not a wet weather sport. We got rained on really good. When the weather did lighten up for a few minutes every now and then, however, we really appreciated it. We saw the 12 Apostles just before sunset on the first day and it was incredible. The sun just dipping bellow the heavy storm clouds for long enough for us to get a photo. Between the first trip with Ken and Alison and the second we saw most of the GOR dryish. I guess we really piclked the wrong time of year for this trip!
Being scared to drive in the dark (not scared OF the roo's, rather more scared of hitting one and losing our bond) we camped in Port Fairy. This sounds bad.... but we stopped next to a public toilet outside a pub for the night. It was real nice (not... but
it was free, and free is good). Founded by whalers from Devon around 1850 there is lots of settlement history here and the original buildings have not been touched by time. It is a really quaint little town. We went for a strole down to the quayside in the morning and saw some seals paying in the water, bobbing up and down and floating on their backs. We also saw a much nicer place to have camped had we kept looking, although I am not sure I really want to continue this trip in the civilised world by measuring one toilet against another. I was over that after leaving Asia.
Leaving Port Fairy behind, our next destination was planned to be Kangaroo Island, 13 km of the coast of South Australia and home to loads of native flora and fauna unthreatened by introduced species. Well, on the way we nearly ran out of petrol and we drove late into the night and still did not make it having to camp once more outside a public convenience, which got locked up for the night shortly after we arrived. All I can say is thank god for our earlier bush training
so to speak in Asia. Another night beckoned and another thing which had failed to cross our scatterbrained backpacker minds was how cold it would get at night. "Would you like bedding?" our friendly Britz rental lady quipped as we picked up the van. Bedding? mmmm. "Does it cost anything?" . Stuff that, We would rather keep our hard earned $40 in our pockets. How cold can it get........BLOODY FREEZING! There are only so many layers you can wear without restricting your breathing. Why is it the British relocate here for warmer climates? I reckon big issue sellars have had warmer nights on the streets! When we did finally get to the ferry terminal the rain was coming down like sheets, stair rods, cats and dogs, the lot. The sea looked as rough as a pineapple. And the next ferry was not for another two hours. Bollocks to that for a game of soldiers. We turned around and headed inland to the McLaren Vale.
Oh, now that's more like it. Luckily Chad and Keli had given us a lot of tips for wineries to visit and it took not long to decide to visit them all. Who needs native
flora blah blah when you have over 50 wineries to choose from? By 5pm we were half cut, staggering back to the camper (which we had subtly parked behind and old folks' home in town) having sampled everything available at the cellar doors of Rosemount Estate, D'Arenberg, Hardy's and some others that I cannot even remember. It did not take long to shake off our pikey fears and we soon stopped pretending to know where our middle palate was and how to cleanse it and instead concentrated on working methodically through every list! They really know how to make port over here - the top stuff is never exported to the UK though. The best thing was, because we walked to them all ourselves, it was as free as the wind blows. Bonza!
Next stop Adelaide, only a two hour drive from the old folks' home. Adelaide is a total toilet. There is no other way to describe it. We had planned to spend a while here, and in fact we got into the working vibe and stuck hand down more than a fair share of toilets in exchange for free board and lodging. Unfortunately we soon realised Adelaide
was not to be. It was all a bit crap and our rehashed plans had again gone awry. As a town itself, yes, it has all usuals stuff you would expect from a city, museums, galleries, a zoo, botanic gardens, etc. But here it is all a bit crap. Plus, the place is extremely rough and run by biker gangs and paedophile politicians. In fact, there were three stabbings while we were here, one of whom was (or still is I hope) a backpacker. Not to mention the 8 Great White Shark attacks 2 of which were fatal in the last 6 months. Wild horses would not make me work and live here! Thank God the Barossa Valley is so close! More yummy wine tastings to while away the hours. This time we were on a tour (Groovy Grape), so got guided around the wineries and had a barbeque lunch and stuff. Obviously we got a skin full too, courtesy of Jacobs Creek, Bethany Wines and several others. Another great day in the countryside.
We were quite glad to be leaving SA especially considering the state of the hostel we were staying in (photographed) but nearly didn't. We checked
out and left our bags in reception, as you do. When we returned to the hostel to get our bags we found reception locked up and no staff to be found. Needless to say, Lara was not as keen as I to break the door down so she rang all kinds of people, including the owner of the place who lives in Alice Springs. It worked though and we located a set of keys and retrived our belongings. Job's a good'n.
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