Deserts and Mountains

Leaving the varied experiences of Kangaroo Island on Monday we travelled East to meet up with the coast again at Victor Harbour, where we gratefully booked into a campsite that provided power to recharge batteries and more importantly, hot showers; and we really needed to clean up! An interesting feature of this small seaside town is a causeway to Granite Island where small penguins nest. This granite was also a magnet to Rich as it provided him with a perfect surface for bouldering; that's free climbing on large rocks. I joined him as the sun was setting to watch for the return of these birds from the sea to feed their large fluffy chicks that suddenly began to emerge from their burrows. As it was now dark there are no pics.

As we walked back through the town to our campsite at 9.00pm it was remarkably quiet; the only places open were a large pub, with music issuing from its empty interior (I kid you not) and a pizza parlour where three giggling girls emerged as we passed. That was it!

Next day we left the sleepy bungalowed coast to continue eastward, crossing the Murray river by ferry and entering a huge empty plain with a feeling of forboding, as though embarking on a voyage to Mars. This feeling was somewhat encouraged by the music of John Adams on the Radio that could have accompanied a space movie. After some hours we were relieved to see a mass of rocks on the horizon that confirmed we were heading in the right direction to Mount Arapiles, where we camped for two nights amid pine trees and cool breezes. Rich bouldered to his heart's content while I chuckled over Bill Bryson. (We're taking it in turns to read Down Under.) My exercise was to walk the 'Tourist trail' up to the peak, which was steeper and rockier than I'd been led to believe, and hot!

The next day, my Birthday, we left in a dust storm on the flat plains whipped up by high winds, with warnings of fire hazard. (There are several fires around Melbourne as we just saw in the paper.) Later we entered the Grampian mountains, a huge range rising up from the plains which gave spectacular views from the narrow winding mountain road. Last night we camped at this beautiful place called Hall's Gap where Rich gave me a Birthday treat of a very good meal in a classy Restaurant and we felt decidedly like happy campers in our dusty clothes.

I'm having problems downloading pictures. For some reason at this Internet cafe I can't do it and at other places the connection has been too slow. This is a town called Woolalooloo (or something!) on the coast as we make our way to Melbourne. I hope to find a better place to next download pics and stuff!!