We had a very enjoyable Christmas Day at Coffin Bay, a little seaside town at the southern tip of the Eyre Peninsula, SA. The town is known for Pacific oysters, which are farmed in the bay. We sampled some of these on Christmas day along with many other treats. (photo - the main course) We were with Steve and our friends Tom and Mary who have rejoined us, after having left us at the end of August when we were in Darwin. Steve travelled with us for a few days and Mary and Tom will be with us for about the next month. It's great to have them along again as travelling companions.
While at Coffin Bay we went to the nearby National Park where there was a little bit of sealed road from which we went to a couple of lookouts. The sea here is very clear and with the blue sky of
a sunny day the water is a deep blue colour. We also tackled one 4WD track, which took us into some large sand dunes before we got to the beach. (photo - the track we took is on the RHS) There were a lot of people fishing from the beach but as it was a bit breezy and as we didn't have surf casting rods we just looked at the view and carried on.Before we put Steve on the plane at Whyalla (on the western side of the peninsula) we spent a couple of nights at Cowell. While here we visited a wind farm with 35 turbines but as it was a calm day they were only just ticking over, but still quite impressive with the huge blades approx 35 metres long.
We spent 3 nights at Wilpena Pound and thoroughly enjoyed the Flinders ranges area. One day we went on a long (63km) 4WD trip, which took nearly 7 hours. We were on Willow Springs station, which has a pastoral lease and runs sheep. To avoid over stocking the lease limits the farmer to 4000 head but due to 8 years of drought they are
only carrying 1200 sheep on the 70,000 acres. Many of the stations in the area are turning to tourism for their income and this station had accommodation available. We also paid a fee to use the track. We saw some fantastic country and got great views from the highest point about 960m above sea level. (photo - Flinders ranges with Wilpena Pound in the background) We tend to think of Australia of having nothing but gum trees but in the Flinders there are many stands of Cypress pines.We had a quiet New Years Eve, with drinks and lots of nibbles for tea followed by pancakes with raspberry jam and ice cream for dessert. The next morning Tom and Mary went on a 30min flight around the pound and environs and when they returned we all had eggs Benedict for breakfast, cooked and eaten outside under our awning. This gave us some spare egg whites so Mary made a pavlova, in the gas oven in her van. As you can see, although we are camping we are eating well.
We had a couple of hot days, getting into mid thirties, but there was a swimming pool nearby so we were able to cool off there. We spent another afternoon on a drive through a couple of gorges, (non 4WD) and saw some yellow footed rock wallabies. (see photo) They are endangered but we had been told where to find a small colony. On the way back to our camp we saw a thunderstorm over the pound and saw several good lightning spikes.
While on the Eyre Peninsula, in the Flinders area and also here on the Yorke Peninsula we have seen many quarried stone houses that probably date back to the late 1880's t
o early 1900’s. Some of these houses are now just a pile of rubble, some have just a few walls and chimneys still standing and some are being lived in.We have seen some ruins that once were pastoral stations that were set up on Government leases in the 1850's and onwards to run mostly sheep. The government charged a fee based on what it thought the land could carry, rather than the actual stock and this lead to heavy overstocking. There were bad droughts from 1864 to 1867 and this in combination with over stocking meant that many people just walked off the land when their stock died through lack of water and feed. (photo - Kanyaka station ruins)
On the way from the
Flinders to the Yorke Peninsula we stayed at the country town of Melrose, which was surveyed in 1853 so is one of the first towns in the area. Here there are many old buildings including a couple of pubs 1860 & 1865, flour mill built in 1878 then used as a brewery from 1893 to 1933 and now disused. (see photo)There is a lot of grain grown on Eyre and Yorke Peninsulas so many of the towns have big grain silos and also grain stored outside in covered heaps until the grain is exported out through various ports in the area. On the west side of the Yorke Peninsula there are many small towns with sandy bays. We were camped at Wallaroo beside a nice beach, where we went for a paddle while we watched the sunset.
From Marion Bay at the southern end of the Peninsula we went on a day’s excursion into the Innes National Park. Here we found natural vegetation of mainly low scrub over sand dunes and a few salt lakes. The coastline has high rocky cliffs with numerous sandy bays. From one vantage point above the sea we saw a dark circular shape in the sea that was a school of salmon making it’s way along the beach. We went fishing at a couple of beaches and ended up with five fish – a silver trevally, a king Georg
e whiting, a flathead and two mullet. The takeable size for all these is quite small so the five fish ended up being a large entrée for four of us. Also in the National Park are the remains of Inneston, a gypsum mining town of around 150 people, in the early 1900’s until 1930. There is a walking trail with signboards pointing out various things of historical interest. The gypsum was dug out from a nearby salt lake, crushed and the finished plaster put into 160lb bags. The bags were loaded onto railway trucks that were hauled by teams of Clydesdale horses for 6km to a jetty at Stenhouse Bay. Some of the town’s buildings have been restored and are available for accommodation.(photo restored cottage and ruins)
On the eastern side of the Peninsula we stayed at Edithburgh, a small town by the sea. The town has places for swimming and jetties for fishing. The swimming has been great but the fishing hopeless with a total of two fish caught over two nights and four rods! We found a lovely swimming beach near Troubridge Point and only minutes after we came out of the water four dolphins swam into the bay, but unfortunately they only did a quick pass by so we didn’t get a chance to swim with them. While snorkelling near the town’s tidal swimming pool we came across shark egg cases. Only some sharks lay eggs and the ones we saw were spiral shaped, probably from the Port Jackson shark, which is harmless.
W
e have come across many wind farms while on our travels. (photo - the old and the new)Photo - swimming beach near Edithburg.
