Nullarbor to Kimba
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It rained most of the night but we were safe and dry in the camper and thankful we weren’t tent camping like the folks near us. The idea was to get an early start and get as close to Adelaide as we could. Didn’t work out, as usual. The distraction this time was a Cessna plane parked near the gas station. Turned out a young guy, maybe early twenties, was the pilot. He gives air tours of the Nullarbor cliffs. He and Les “talked planes” for awhile. And while chatting we discovered the locals were also making a collection of local wildlife (spiders and snakes) and had recently discovered a huge black spider. And I mean huge. Probably 2 1/2 to 3 inches across. We spent a few moments photographing it. Les asked if he could take the lid off for a better view but they suggested he not do that since it might jump. And that would be bad because it was extremely poisonous. We decided we were happy to observe it with the lid still on.
We then started to head out. But we stopped. When would we get another chance to fly around the Nullarbor Cliffs. So we went back to inquire.
Well, it was pretty overcast and had just rained all night and I don’t think the guy was too anxious to go up. He said it would take awhile to prep and he’d have to walk the runway to make sure it wasn’t too muddy and no obstacles had come along in the rain. So we agreed we didn’t really have time for all that. But, sure, we’d have a look at the plane. And we spent a half an hour doing that and talking. His father was a commercial pilot. That’s how he learned. General aviation in Australia is fairly restricted, even though it would seem an ideal solution to the distances and remoteness of many areas. Yes, the Flying Doctors came in once a week and used the strip. Etc. etc. We probably ended up burning as much time as it would have taken to prep.
So along about 9 or 9:30 we finally headed out towards Adelaide. The flat treeless Nullarbor continued for probably the first 50 km but then returned to the brushy shrub and small trees that we’d seen on the way in. This then evolved into farmland and fields. Lots of wide open spaces had been cleared and it appeared wheat or some other grass-like plant was being grown. Or sheep. Lots of sheep. This continued until we stopped this evening and I expect will continue tomorrow. It’s kind of pretty. Rolling hills with occasional trees. All the roads though are lined with trees. This seems to be an Australian rule or something. Every road is lined with trees, including all the dirt side roads. They clear the fields up to about 8-10 feet from the road. It’s nice actually.
We spent the day driving and stopping for gas. But towards the end of the day we started having “aren’t we going to do anything today” anxiety. In a little town called Penong, we stopped at the Penong Wool Shed museum and trinket store. An older lady volunteer was running the place. Her accent was so thick we could barely understand her. It’s mostly a shop for local crafts but in the back was a collection of artifacts from the area, including an old telephone switch, old farm implements and a salt-encrusted cow skull among other things. We bought a few trinkets since we’re woefully low on such things.
Another 80 or 100 km more and we came to the Fruit Fly Inspection Station at Ceduna. They are concerned about fruit flies migrating from Western Australia into Southern Australia, so much like at the California border, they inspect for fruit and vegetables. We thought all we had was a single potato but when the time came, we couldn’t find the potato and came up with a couple of oranges. Oops. But not enough of an issue to raise any alarms and the inspector let us go. (We found the potato when we stopped. Marion will understand why I couldn’t find it in the fridge when I looked… but neither did the inspector.)
We now entered the Eyre Peninsula and had to make a decision whether to continue along the coast or cut across. The coast road promised swimmable beaches, pretty coastline, etc. but we just don’t have the time. We kept saying “well… what if we did this, or that” but there’s just no way.
So, another 200km of farmland. But the good news is, the clouds have finally broken up and the sun has come out. And, it’s not overly hot. Perfect weather. Along the way we saw two Major Mitchell’s macaws sitting on a tree branch right off the road. These are the white macaws with pink crests and underbellies that we had seen at the Parrot and Macaw place a few days ago and the guy had told us were worth 15K each if you could manage to smuggle them out of the country. We thought that was at least worth a picture and stopped for a few (sorry, used my analog/telephoto so none to post except very long distance ones). We’re still not used to coming across birds like this just out there in the trees. Macaws, parrots, pink galahs, lorikeets and more. Very colorful.
We stopped for another road picture and discovered a skink (I think). A large lizard-like animal that I practically stepped on taking a picture of farmland and trees. Then confused which end was the head. Les was poking at it and the “other” end opened its mouth! Anyway, it reminded us that we needed to do a better job of looking for snakes. One of the snakes they had at the campsite was a Brown Snake which they described as having “enough venom to kill us all”. (Frankly, I don’t understand what evolutionary problem is being solved by a snake that can kill a horse. It’s sort of like having enough nukes to blow up the world 2 or 3 times.)
We also saw three of four wombats, but not in a functional state. There was a stretch of road where it seemed like there must be a herd of them (or whatever you call a group of wombats) because they were clearly a traffic hazard. Poor things.
We came into Minnipa and entered “Granite Country”. Apparently the Eyre Peninsula is a giant chunk of granite, or at least a good portion of it is. And some of it has popped through. There are a series of famous rocks in the area. The one in Minnipa was 15km down a bad dirt road so we had to give it up. But there were 3 in the next town, Wudinna, that were more accessible, so we went to see them.
The first one (sorry, name escapes me) is a good sized monolith. We went out and “hiked” on it for 15 minutes or so. That will give you a sense of the size. It took that long to walk across it and back. The next one was called Turtle Rock, because it supposedly looks like a turtle. But it was well off the road and we didn’t make it out to it, because we decided instead to go see the really big one, Mt Wudinna. Mt. Wudinna is the second largest monolith in Australia after Ayers Rock. And since there’s just no way we’re going to get out to Ayers Rock, we figured we ought to see this one. (Number two, but trying harder.). It’s not in the same league as Ayers Rock but it’s still pretty impressive. 260 meters high according to the signs.
You can take a hike up one side and down the other, complete with interpretive signs. About a 1km walk. But a little steep :-). At the bottom on the way back to the car, we came across some lorikeets and got their pictures.
We only had about a quarter tank of gas when we ventured off the road to see the rocks. Now we needed some gas, but the station in town was closed (Sunday night after all). 88km to the next town of Kimba. So once again, we were watching the gas gauge drop as we kept our fingers crossed. But we had a lot more confidence knowing about how long we had once the light came on, from our last experience, and we made it with no problem. Heck we had 8 liters left this time. And it was very nice having the afternoon/evening sun back again. The late afternoon light here is beautiful. We noticed it up north and it still doesn’t disappoint here in the south central. Turns everything a warm golden color. Les says it reminds him of the south of France.
Kimba’s claim to fame (other than having the same name as the white lion in the cartoon series I remember as a child) is that it’s halfway across Australia. It actually seems like it’s a bit more than halfway but who are we to argue. We went into the pub in town since the campground guy told us it was nice and we hadn’t been to one before. But they had stopped serving food and we hadn’t had anything to eat so we went back to the campsite for spaghetti. (It was nice though.) But tomorrow, before we leave town, we get to see the “Big Galah”. I won’t ruin the surprise.
We did 660km today. Going to try to make Adelaide tomorrow. Looks like we might get a decent star show tonight finally.
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