Travelling Archives - Page 2 of 2

Kiata Campground

A week or so ago we decided that we needed to get away for a few days. After looking for places that we haven’t seen we lit upon the Kiata Campground in the Little Desert National Park in Victoria.

The drive was a bit over 500 km’s and was pretty boring. It was made a bit more interesting by the GPS deciding that it wasn’t going to play nicely but eventually we got there and got set up.

For the first day it was hot – around 36degC so we lounged around in the shade or inside the camper. We went for a short explore around the campground but that was about it.

The next couple of days it was windy and I mean WINDY. We spent the day listening to the canvas flap and putting the awning poles back up. In the end we got sick of the awning poles coming down so we packed it up and lived without it. We did have a mob of emu’s stroll through the campground though.

The next day we had howling wind and showers so we just spent the time indoors. We couldn’t even do any idle web surfing as we only had, at best, one bar of 3G mobile coverage. Afternoon naps followed by dinner and a couple of glasses of plonk with some musings on the state of play.

The plonk we were drinking. A bloody nice drop it is too. This was taken in the kitchen at home and NOT in the camper.

On Saturday night went into Nhill for dinner at the one of the pubs. It was crap. Jenny’s meal, Veal Cordon Bleu, was overcooked to buggery verging on burnt and my spinach and ricotta ravioli was frozen and reheated to the point of disintegration. The sauce was watery and flavourless. We won’t be going back there.

One good thing did come out of it though. We found we had a relative living in Nhill. We didn’t get to see them but we will next time.

After we got back to our camp a young bloke came over and asked if we had jumper leads as his battery was dead flat. They were a pair of nice young guys who were European tourists doing a lap in a Ford station wagon and had had a bit of bad luck with their previous car (broken head gasket) and had just got this one a couple of days previously. They’d been sitting in the car all day out of the wind, and I can’t blame them for that at all, listening to the radio and flattened the battery. Using the Anderson plug on the Land Rover we managed to get their battery charged enough for them to get their car started. They went off on a drive for about an hour to properly charge it. I hope they were OK after we left.

Sunday, it dawned overcast and still but we had to pack up and leave. Got all packed up and ready to go by around 10.30am and off we went. The drive home, as expected, was a boring affair with the only interest being a bit of heavy traffic over the West gate Bridge.

Oodnadatta and beyond

This trip was supposed to be from Moe in South East Victoria to Coober Pedy to Oodnadatta, Maree, Birdsville and back to Moe via central NSW.

The bit from Moe to Oodnadatta went without a hitch. apart from some rain in Coober Pedy which we thought may well put the next leg to Oodnadatta in doubt but the roads stayed open so we ventured forth.

After arriving in Oodnadatta we set up the camper and figured a drink at the Transcontinental Hotel before dinner was in order. What could possibly go wrong ? Surely no harm could come of a couple of drinks before dinner, could it ? Six hours later at around midnight after a LOT of drinks we staggered back to the caravan park. A quick sandwich and into bed.

Then it started raining. There was about 13mm in total which doesn’t seem like much but the flat outback landscape turned to a big mud hole with all roads closed.

We spent a couple of days exploring Oodnadatta hoping that the roads would open but no luck until just before lunch on our third day a worker from Roads SA advised us that the road to Marla would be open in half an hour and would close again about an hour later. We hurriedly packed up and set sail for Marla which was the opposite direction that we wanted to take. Oh well such is life.

There were a number of muddy and slippery creek crossings along the way but we managed to avoid getting bogged although the car and camper collected a bit of red mud.

Got to Marla OK and spent a pleasant night there before setting off to Coober Pedy. Just outside of Coober Pedy there was a gentle thump, thump, thump noise starting to come from under the car. At first we thought is was a tyre trying to disintegrate but in the end it transpired that the gearbox was busily failing but working on the theory that every kilometre driven was a kilometre that we didn’t have to pay for on a flat top we carried on. As we progressed it got louder and louder but it was still hanging in there.

We eventually got to Barmah and found a decent spot beside the Murray for a camp.

The next morning, of course, the weather turned really nasty. Squalls, thunderstorms, howling winds and rain. Lots of rain. We packed up between squalls and hightailed it to a local Scotts Restaurant (McDonalds) for breakfast. The drive back to Moe was an anxiety ridden affair with the thumping getting louder but the car got us home.

When I sent the gearbox off to be rebuilt the fifth gear bits were a mess.