Dennis does SkyTrek.

We experienced a frosty start to the day - our campers were quite damp - even inside - but the day was glorious 🌞🌞. With Dennis at the helm of his trusty Ranger Ute, and Darryl along side as navigator and reader of notes, we set off on this day long trek.

            

                 Morning tea at Moxans Hut.

The whole SkyTrek is done very well with accompanying notes giving bits of information along the way about history, flora, fauna, geology, and titbits of interest. It's surprising how many people do this trek and we've noticed other stations offer 4WD experiences as well. 

            

The variety of lansdapes on this one property was amazing - from gum studded creek beds, bald hills, rocky terrain to real saltbush desert scenery. 

         

The track was pretty good until the last bit where you are advised to select 4 WD - and boy do you need it!  Dennis has now qualified as an off road driver and he managed the rocky steep ascents and descents very well - better than Tops and I sitting in the back!!  

         A view of the homestead on our home stretch. - they hosted a wedding today.

It's a great way to see a property of this size and to acknowledge the difficulties they would have in mustering the sheep - they seemed to be dotted everywhere! More prolific were the kangaroos and euros - and even emus! No wonder they need to have regular culling! We would recommend this tour to anyone - it is a great way for the owners to supplement their income and allows us tourists a glimpse into this beautiful part of the world.

        The old grader which originally graded the track.

We are now camped by another creek bed at Arkaroola. We had a great trip here - we went the back way on the eastern side of the ranges and saw more interesting scenery. We deviated from the road into Chambers Gorge for lunch and were very impressed with this drive along the creek bed - which still had a bit of water in and stones! We must have crossed dozens and dozens of creeks so it would be great to see these creeks flowing. Tomorrow we are booked into the Ridge Top tour so chose the afternoon trip as an 8am start in a troop carrier would be rather chilly! We hope by 1pm it will be pleasant.  Tonight we have the lamb roast cooking on the campfire but tomorrow night Dennis and Darryl are taking us ladies out for dinner at the restaurant here. 🍴🍝🍤. 

With no mobile phone access and only limited internet up at the shop, we are pretty well cut off from everyone - we don't even know how everyone's weekend went. Even though we aren't in touch, we are thinking of you all. 😏

Love to everyone from the happy travellers. ❌❌❌⭕️⭕️⭕️

Onto the Flinders Ranges

Well, the rain stopped and were able to pack up and leave Melrose nice and dry. Our travels northwards took us through Quorn and then Hawker till we arrived at our destination Willlow Springs.  

        

              A couple of lovelies next to beautiful Sturt Desert Peas - at Hawker.

Our initial impression was 'oh dear', as the beautiful big trees around Wilpena were replaced by big bare stony hills - but Darryl's research paid off and our camp site is great. We are set up alongside a dry creek bed - very private and secluded but with our own drop toilet and back at the homestead (a 15min walk or 2 min drive) we have flush toilets and showers. Luxurious!!  We have a fire pit and picnic table and the area is nice and flat for our campers. 

           Camp Bray / Greenwood at Willow Springs.

Gee the nights are cold though and thank heavens for the campfire, hotwater bottles, big jackets and lots of rugs. We are as warm as toast in our campers. However, the cold nights herald beautiful sunny days and today probably got to 17 at one stage so we can't complain. It's interesting that feral goats have been almost eradicated ( we saw 3 today) but the kangaroo, euro and wallaby populations are very extensive - we saw them everywhere today and as I write this they are around our campsite - but thankfully they aren't pesky and don't get into our gear. The station owners here are able to cull 1200 a year - that wouldn't make much of an impression on the numbers we reckon. It was good to see the Yellow Footed Rick Wallabies today - on the way back from extinction following the goat reduction.

We packed up our picnic baskets and headed on a tour of the ranges today and boy, are they spectacular!! We went to Wilpena Pound and had a look around there then headed on the scenic route through the Bunyeroo and Brachina Gorges. 

           

     We saw this gypsy van being towed by 2 lovely draught horses - what a lovely way to travel through this lovely country. But boy, the horses were working pretty hard up and down the hills.

         

This tour takes you along many creek beds - some still had a bit of water so Darryl can say he did creek crossings again!  The geological formations are amazing and cameras and words really can't capture the beauty of the mountains. No wonder Hans Heyson loved this area! We saw today where he used to camp and paint.

We carried onto Parachilna where we saw the Prairie Hotel where all sorts of exotic foods are on the menu - kangaroo, emu, camel ........ We are happy to come back to camp to enjoy pasta! 

              

Tomorrow we are off on a SkyTrack self drive tour of the property. The property is 70,000 acres and they run 1 sheep to 16 acres (plus heaps of kangaroos)  The tour is 80 kms and takes 7 hours to complete but the way Dennis drives we'll do it in half the time 😃😃.  I'm hoping on some hill on the track there will be mobile phone coverage so I can post this - otherwise it will be posted when we pop back into Wilpena Pound for fuel. We've found that fuel and grocery supplies are not in abundance so thank heavens we stocked up at Port Augusta. 

Can't believe it's not even a week yet since we ventured off - our time will slip by quickly! Trust all our readers are well .... Till next blog ❌❌❌ from Marg, Darryl, Dennis, Tops 

Days two and three.

Well what a beautiful day we had to travel through some of the most lovely parts of South Australian countryside. We awoke in the morning  to a beautiful sight of paddle steamers cruising up the Murray - looked like a very relaxing way to enjoy the glorious Murray River. 

       

                    

      

        

In my pyjama pants and looking most glamorous - just out of bed, I went for a quick walk and ran into South Australian football legend Neil Kerley. After a chat to him I found out the exact location of Murray's shack  - it's number 9. I'm sure Neil would have gone into wife Barb and said "I just met the weirdest lady thismorning!!!"  At least we are sure of which shack was ours. 

        Here is the shack - not the Pink Pussy anymore!

           

We left Walkers Flat  and headed to Mt Pleasant and then travelled to Williamstown - how disappointing Marg and Brian weren't home today so we could enjoy a cuppa with them. The Barossa Valley was looking magnificent in the brilliant sunshine and Dennis and Tops were suitably impressed with the beauty of the region. The crops in South Australia are looking fantastic and we saw acres and acres of green paddocks - looks like being a bumper year here. 

We had lunch in a lovely park at Clare then travelled onto Melrose. This is the oldest town in the Flinders and is very quaint. Just after we'd set up, the rain came in and unfortunately, it's been cold, damp and miserable the whole time since. We did a quick lap of the town and ended up in the local pub for a drink before returning to camp. Fortunately we were able to sit around the camp fire and keep warm.  I don't think there's been much rain just a lot of drizzle and low clouds. It's too miserable to tackle Mount Remarkable too as  the tracks are wet and muddy.  We were also disappointed that the old Blacksmiths place is now closed - last time here we enjoyed a coffee in this historic building. We had to go on to Wilmington for a coffee. This was in a strange place too - an old supermarket building with an op shop in the same building. The coffee was delicious and we were nice and warm so we were happy. All in all we think Melrose is a place to avoid in winter! ☔️💦 

 We spent the day today in Port Augusta and except for the waterfront area that's very nicely presented, nothing much else took our fancy. We did enjoy a nice fish 'n chips lunch and replenished our food supplies ready for tackling the outback! Now we are back at camp and wondering how we are going to keep warm tonight as its still drizzling and pretty cold. I think we'll utilise their camp kitchen. We do hope tomorrow is fine as we plan to move onto Willow Springs Station and tour leader Darryl has some sightseeing trips planned.

We hope everyone is well and until our next blog, send our love and best wishes.  xxxxxxx

Farina

Well here we are in South Australia's Riverland with our ultimate goal to visit Farina in the state's Upper North. Farina is a ghost town that is operated by volunteers for two months and Kerang's  local baker opens the bakery for two weeks. So we're travelling 1500 kms to buy a loaf of bread from him!!

We left Sunday morning in very frosty conditions and travelled along Victoria's scenic drive through Chinkapook to Ouyen and Pinnaroo. We enjoyed our first morning tea at Ouyen and lunch at Pinnaroo and there we saw a shop display to rival the girls "Tailored Peach". 

               

We then headed north to Loxton and Berri then found a great camping spot on the Lyrup Flats right by the Murray River. We set up quickly and found ourselves having a wine and beer at 4pm!! Needless to say we were ready for bed by 8.30 and had a VERY long night!  We were surprised when the chap camped up the way came to say hello - he was Chris Clough from Kerang and his family - he recognised Dennis's laugh! 

       

We had to spend time in Renmark thismorning while our zip was repaired - lucky there was a Big W in the town to visit while we were waiting and Tops was able to buy more plates! Yes, a couple of plates were broken on our trip yesterday and we weren't even off road!!  We had a coffee on the waterfront which is very picturesque - Dennis and Tops have been very impressed with the presentation of the towns like Berri, Loxton, Waikerie and Renmark. 

This is our last trip in our current campers as we are both upgrading - and before we left I put a "For Sale" sign on our camper's  spare tyre - much to Darryl and Dennis's amusement - but we've already had one enquiry so hopefully something comes from my little notice. 

We travelled from Waikerie to Blanchetown and then to Swan Reach and now are camped at Walkers Flat. Darryl's family had a shack here till 1973 and he has many fond memories of great times here - through floods, skiing, fishing and happy family times. It's all changed though and we find it difficult to recognise the old shack though Darryl did find Fowerakers shack. We had a lot of laughs remembering poor Ron Foweraker having his dressing gown cut to a happy coat and the boys getting the boat lost in the willows! 

  

          

The beautiful cliffs at Walkers Flat. 

        

Trev and Sandy, we think this is the Foweraker shack. 

Tomorrow we show off the Barossa Valley and Clare Valley so Dennis and Tops will see more picturesque country. We plan to camp at Melrose and will be able to have a proper shower and may even do a load of washing. Our weather has been cool but quite sunny and we hope there is no rain on the radar. We were as warm as toast in our campers last night with our hot water bottles. Gee we must be getting old!! 

Hope everything is good with all our readers. We wish our 'baby' Josh a very happy birthday today. 🎈🎈🎊

Till our next blog, love from the travellers. 

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