We arrived at Cactus Beach (or, to be more accurate, the Point Sinclair campground) on the public holiday Monday in the middle of the school holidays, but despite this we found a lovely spot for the caravan close to the beach and the "facilities". It was quite special coming to this place where Andrew had spent so much time before he had a family and "commitments". Andrew was in the water with his surfboard within an hour, while the girls worked out a complicated game in the sand-dunes and I did my usual "chooking" around. As we had run out of water on the Nullarbor, I had to bring buckets of bore water over to the van and heat them in the gas kettle so I could wash the dishes.
The weather was beautiful and there was a lovely clear night for star-gazing by the beach (the best place for star-gazing).
In the morning Andrew had another surf (he was very lucky with the weather conditions) and I ate my breakfast on the "surfers' chair" overlooking the surf beach. I even read my book for a whole five minutes before Tahlia came to join me. We didn't really hang around, although there wasn't the usual 10am deadline imposed in caravan parks, because our caravan batteries had completely died and things in the fridge were starting to warm up a bit. We packed up and drove to Ceduna, where we had lunch sitting on a very windy and cold foreshore. I didn't much take to Ceduna - particularly when the bakery didn't take EFTPOS (everyone on the Nullarbor did, but not the bakery in Ceduna!) but we didn't really give it a fair go. We sped on to Streaky Bay, where we couldn't believe our luck, finding that we had been assigned one of those caravan sites that OTHER people always seem to get - ie right on the foreshore about 5m from the water's edge. After so much rushing around in the previous two weeks (we had had six stops in the previous seven nights) I suddenly felt I just couldn't face any more, and suggested that rather than move on again the next day to spend two nights in Coffin Bay - adding an extra 200km to the homeward journey by going to the bottom of the Eyre Peninsula - we spend two more nights in Streaky Bay instead, enjoying the lovely spot, and then head straight across to Port Augusta and home. The girls were strongly in favour, and Andrew agreeable, so I went to book an extension, only to find that our site was booked from the following day and we would have to move! To cut a long story short, we still decided we would still stay there rather than travel down to Coffin Bay, with no time to do it justice and lousy weather anyway - but it was AWFUL having to pack up the van and move 50m to another site within the park! No more water's edge, either - just the usual dirt site facing the back of a cabin. It was so windy we couldn't even leave the chairs set up.
We didn't do much in the two days we had there, but there still seems to be plenty to write about. We went on a couple of scenic drives around the district, and stopped to look at Murphy's Haystacks (granite rocks mistaken for haystacks by someone who used them to illustrate a point about what hard work could achieve, and they've kept the name ever since) and the sealion colony at Point Labatt, where you can watch the sealions lolling around on the rocks for hours. One of the most striking things about the scenic drives was the number of sleepy lizards we saw on the road. Literally two or more every kilometre - all blithely crossing the road. I'm pleased to report we didn't squash any of them. Andrew became very good at judging how fast they were moving and running our wheels on either side of them. The funny thing was, we never saw any in the bush when we stopped to walk around - only on the road!
We went to great lengths to find the apparently fantastic Yanerbie sand-dunes, so we could sand-board on them. We eventually did find them (not without a few anxious minutes driving on a very narrow and overgrown sandy track) and tried sliding down them on our boogie-boards, but it wasn't terribly successful. It was also freezing cold and blowing a gale!
The best part of our stay at Streaky Bay was the dinner we had at the pub, where the food and the service were just fantastic. Probably the best we'd encountered all trip (not that we ate out all that often). We were very tempted to go back the next night, but didn't on the grounds that (apart from being extravagant) we were likely to end up disappointed and that would spoil the memory of the first night! (How cynical is that?) As you might gather, our spirits (mainly mine) weren't very high - the prospect of the trip being nearly over killing my enthusiasm for the sight-seeing and making it hard to keep up the manic pace of the previous three months. Still, we had our last night in Mambray Creek to look forward to............. ending up where we started 97 nights before.
Mambray Creek is such a beautiful spot - it was a great place to finish our trip. We had a lovely campsite in amongst the amazing massive old gum trees, and we were visited by a particularly friendly kookaburra - my favourite type of bird - which was very special. The campground has hot showers and flushing toilets, but still retains the sense of being "out bush". If it hadn't been for the ridiculously noisy neighbours, it would have been perfect. And that was our 98th night - the last one before we headed back to Adelaide. We arrived home late afternoon with that strange feeling you get when you've been away for some time, and yet nothing seems to have changed. The neighbour waves as you go past, the chooks demand food, you put the kettle on and suddenly that's it: THE END.
Trip summary
We travelled 20,080km in 98 days. We spent $5,800 in fuel and $4,162 in accommodation (ave $42.50 per night). The most expensive caravan park (powered site) was $72/night for the five of us (on a long weekend) and the cheapest was $25. We had one flat tyre (on the caravan) and a chip in the car windscreen. Our Territory was fantastic - although fuel consumption averaged about 19 litres per 100km. We should have bought new batteries for the caravan, which would have given us much more scope for non-caravan park camping. The things I missed most on the trip were: the dishwasher, an ensuite bathroom and carpet, while the most useful "extra" things we took with us were: the wireless broadband "dongle", the electric frypan and the photo printer. I hope you've enjoyed reading our blog and I thoroughly recommend this kind of trip to everyone. What an amazing country we live in!
Captions for photos
- Reflections on the blue lake between Penong and Point Sinclair
- Andrew surfing at Cactus Beach
- Sturt Desert peas in a pot on the main street in Ceduna
- Picnic lunch in Ceduna
- The famous replica Great White Shark in Streaky Bay - at over 5m long the largest ever caught on a rod. Why they want to associate Streaky Bay with a killer shark, I do not know, but the stubby holders all bear its image.
- Two of the many sleepy lizards playing chicken with the traffic on the roads around Streaky Bay
- Murphy's Haystacks. I wonder if Murphy was Irish. I mean - seriously - how do you mistake these for haystacks?
- Sealions living a much more peaceful existence than the lizards
- It was REALLY cold at Point Labatt
- Our campsite at Mambray Creek
- Not a great shot, but it was just so special having the kookaburra come so close
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