Day 26 - Halls Gap to Ferntree Gully

I woke early this morning, exited the tent, and was greeted to about 30 kangaroos in the caravan park. I wonder if they have to pay $28 a night to stay here? It was quite a pleasent morning weather wise, so i decided to climb up a nearby mountain while i was here, it had quite a good view over Lake Belfield. After I was back at the car, I basically headed towards home picking up a few caches on the way.

Distance Driven: 313.9km (7903.4km total)
Geocaches Found: 9 (9 Trad)(210Total)
Caravan Park Rating: Home Sweet Home

More stats to follow in the next couple of days

Day 25 – Hamilton to Halls Gap

Today started with Andre’s five kids attempting to be quiet and sneaking up to me on the lounge floor to see if I was awake and me just pretending to be asleep. Anyway, at 8.30, Lindi took three of the kids to school and I said goodbye to Andre and the remaining kids and was on my way.

Today was a rather short driving day. I started by finding a couple of Hamilton caches, then made my way towards Dunkeld. I went into the Visitors centre where I was told I was lucky to be getting through as the Road to halls Gap had only just re-opened 10 days earlier after the floods earlier in the year. I started heading towards Halls gap and noticed a cache at Picaninni, not far along which had great views. So, I grabbed the camera and the GPS and headed the 2.4km track. I reached the top and indeed the views were marvellous, I get  the camera out and get the message “Change Battery Pack”, no problem, spare battery is in my pocket…… No it’s not, back in the car on the front seat…. Bugger, anyway, I know there was a great view, Sat for a while and walked back to the car. I continued along the road and was going to climb Mount abrupt, but the track to the summit was still closed, so I moved onto another cache caller “Ripping Yarns #1” which turned out to be quite a difficult one. I ended up going cross country bush bashing for ~150 metres to a rock face which I had to climb to claim the prize. The view was worth it, fantastic. In the cache, I found a Harry Potter travel Bug with a Broken wand and I just accidentally broke his head off!! Soon after I got back to the car, I headed for Halls Gap, where I have booked into my very last caravan park for this Holiday. I have been hit by the tired police, so have decided to spend the rest of the afternoon resting at the campground, ready for a four or so hour drive home tomorrow.

About a dozen or so Kangaroos have just hopped into the campground and are quietly nibbling on the grass.

Distance Driven: 115.0km (7589.5km total)
Geocaches Found: 5 (5 Trad)(201 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 8.5/10 (I Have stayed here before, Nice grassed areas for tents, Clean Toilet/Shower Blocks. Nothing special)

Day 24 – Murray Bridge to Hamilton

Today was not too bad considering I had 500+ km drive to get to Hamilton. I started by heading towards Bordertown for a mid-morning snack. I also found a few caches on the way. I continued on, stopping every hour or so for a break to go for a walk or find a cache. I eventually arrived in Hamilton at ~3.30 and amazingly was still able to navigate my way to Andre’s place from memory. Had a Nice dinner with the family and now sitting in peace writing this blog.

Distance Driven: 516.5km (7474.5km total)
Geocaches Found: 11 (11 Trad)(196 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 10/10 (Can’t Beat indoors on a Friends Lounge room floor!)

Day 23 – Tanunda to Murray Bridge

Didn’t drive too far today, but I did have an adventure – in Geocaching. That’s right folks, I managed to find 30 Traditional caches. Add to that the 12 I was not able to find and that makes my biggest caching day ever. I also saw the most animals of the trip today too.

The first 6 or so involved Walks in and around Mount Crawford state park which was really quite nice and varied terrain. The remainder of them were on side roads on the way to Murray Bridge as well as a good proportion of the caches in the town itself. As a result of trying to get 30, I didn’t get back to the caravan park until just before 8PM.

As for the animals I saw, they would be fine fare at almost any dinner table. There was Sheep, Cows, Emu, Kangaroos, A Koala(Climbing a Pine tree of all things), Lamas(Or maybe they were Alpacas), A Blue tongue Lizard (I Think) and a couple of horses (To be fair, they had riders on them so probably shouldn’t be eaten!) Tomorrow I have a longish drive to Hamilton, where I will stay at Andre’s for the night. I will be either on the floor or in the tent in the back yard. Whichever way, It will be great to catch up.

Distance Driven: 185.6km (6958.0km total) 6958
Geocaches Found: 30 (30 Trad)(185 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 8/10 (Great View over the river, excellent Dining room/Kitchen, nice grass to pitch the tent.)

Day 22 – Tanunda (Barossa Valley)

Had another mighty fine day today (Although it does get a lot colder here at nights and early mornings). The tour bus was not picking me up until 10.15, so I had a leisurely morning, breakfast, made a coffee and read a book until 10am. There were six other people on the tour plus the driver John. The tour covered about 4 wineries, each of them quite different. We deliberately steered away from the big wineries as they were usually very busy and it would be difficult to get a seat at the bar. We stopped at Grant Burge first, followed by Te.Aro Estate where we had a beautiful Platter lunch. We then stopped at Domain Day and last but not least we stopped at Linfield Road Wines, in my opinion, the best of the bunch (I bought a total of 7 bottles from there). We were then all driven back to our various accommodations’.

I spent the rest of the day geocaching in Tanunda, had a very good time, especially when at the second cache, I met a group of other cachers, so we completed this one together. One of the guys is even more obsessed then me, he has kitted his car out for caching!! He has over 2500 finds.

Anyway, tonight I treated myself to a pizza and am eating and typing right now!!

Distance Driven: 0km (6772.4km total)
Geocaches Found: 4 (3 Trad, 1 multi)(155 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 8.5/10 (A bit more luxury at a price, excellent games room, kitchen as well as outdoor stuff like giant pillow, pool, playground and they even had an amphitheatre, (Forgot to mention Basketball Court in yesterdays Blog) Beautiful setting, nice grass to pitch the tent.)

Day 21 – Port Pirie to Tanunda (Barossa Valley)

My car is still behaving.

Today was not a bad day, I spent the first half kriss crossing across the Clare Valley, a beautiful leisurely drive where I didn’t really have somewhere I absolutely had to be. It was good. I then made my way back across towards the Barossa Valley via some smaller towns you would never have heard of before. I arrived in Tanunda at about 3PM, then decided I would like to do some sort of winery tour. So I went to the visitor information centre and they organised for the bus to pick me up at 10.15 in the morning. Apparently it goes for about 5 hours and includes lunch. So for $85, probably not bad value. That’s all I have to tell for today, except that I am amazed at the sheer amount of wineries here in the Barossa as well as in the Clare Valley.

I am currently sitting in the caravan park drinking beer (Probably should be wine) and chewing on some peanuts. Ahhh the life.

Distance Driven: 307.4km (6772.4km total)
Geocaches Found: 12 (12 Trad)(152 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 8.5/10 (A bit more luxury at a price, excellent games room, kitchen as well as outdoor stuff like giant pillow, pool, playground and they even had an amphitheatre, Beautiful setting, nice grass to pitch the tent.)

Day 20 – Coober Pedy to Port Pirie

Not too much to tell about today. My car is still behaving.

Some things I forgot about yesterday; Saw my first dingo just outside Alice Springs just as I was on my way out of town. Also saw some scrawny red kangaroos the day before at the Desert Park. Nearly ran over 2 lizards, one normal looking, the other had an orange head and neck and the rest of his body was a light brown.

Anyway, onto today, another long stretch of driving which seemed to be a lot easier this time then on the way up, maybe I am just used to it. It also seemed more interesting coming the other way. I stopped at Port Augusta for lunch and more of a look around, then onto Port Pirie for a rest and to work out some sort of plan for tomorrow.

Distance Driven: 649.9km (6465.0km total)
Geocaches Found: 6 (6 Trad)(140 Total)
Caravan Park Rating: 6/10 (Basic, Nice setting, no frills)