21 November 2011 - Port Germain Gorge, South Australia

Last night we sat eating our dinner in the caravan with kangaroos grazing so near, and the noisy crows making their presence felt. I had no regrets that we had come to the Wilpena Resort rather than camp at least thirty kilometres up the road at the Dingley Dell Campground. Mind you, there is no saying whether the roos would have been as quite as populous at that camp.

This morning we packed up and filled with the rather dubious water available, then headed off out of the park. We had during our stay, being using water on board for drinking and cooking, and that from the few taps in the park for washing, however we decided that since there were no warning signs about regarding the water, we would take a punt and use it to refill our tanks.

The forty kilometre trip over the rolling hills to Hawker was as lovely as it had been coming in. Today we passed a large flock of sheep being driven along the wide roadside reserve, hopefully toward the woolshed for some well needed shearing. At Hawker we purchased today’s newspaper (it is always so satisfying to buy the  newspaper on publishing day – a treat I would never have considered so before travelling in the outback where papers are always several days old)  and three screws for the caravan hubcaps at a mechanical workshop. I had suggested to Chris he try any engineering workshop for these replacement screws, but he had insisted we would only be able to get them at an engineering supply outlet. He was proved wrong, but not so surprisingly; these country workshops need to stock all sorts of spares given their isolation. He was however disgusted to pay $2 per screw!

We continued retracing our route south across the Willochra Plains to Quorn, where we pulled into a small shady park for lunch. Chris had the wheel hubs repaired before I had lunch on the table, and we were soon on our way again, but this time taking a new route, south east and still travelling across the flat lands of the same plains. The grazing land use however gave way to cereal crops, and great expanses of yellow stretched far out as far as the Horseshoe Range which ran parallel to us in the east.

Soon we arrived at Wilmington, an immaculate small township originally called Beautiful Valley by the pioneers who settled here in the mid-1850s. The town boasts both a toy and puppet museum, however neither particularly interested us. There are also some interesting looking walks and drives about, however we were more interested in travelling on rather than  discover the further delights of this settlement.

Views over the beautiful valley

Another twenty three kilometres on and we arrived in another quaint and very tidy town, Melrose, the oldest town in the Flinders, established in the 1840’s with the discovery of copper. The town is tucked at the foot of Mount Remarkable and unlike the three other settlements passed through today, well-populated with trees if not people. Today it has pubs, accommodation, a very small general store and a bicycle shop, all catering more for the tourist rather than the locals who probably travel through to Quorn or Port Augusta. There are numerous cycle tracks and walks around (including the Mawson Cycle Trail and the Heyson Trail) so we imagine that this place is abuzz at better times of the year when cyclists or walkers are less likely to perish from the heat. Having said that, the temperatures today have been pleasantly cool, around thirty or so, but then anything these days for us under about 34 degrees is considered relatively cool. We spent some time wandering the hundred metres of township and then climbed the lookout hill above the town to the War Memorial, from which we enjoyed panoramic views over the plain toward the far hills. We descended and enjoyed seeing the jacarandas in the street and the hollyhocks and geraniums flowering in the few front yards before heading off once more.

Soon after leaving Melrose we turned westward toward the Spencer Gulf, following the Germain Creek through the deep ravine cut in rocks not unlike those enjoyed in the Flinders Ranges (but then technically we are still in the Flinders). Our Tomtom confirmed when we were nine kilometres from the junction with the main highway, and we turned up a gravel road to find this camp as per the Camps 5 bible. A Winnebago motorhome towing a rather large 6 cylinder Suzuki 4WD, which we had seen in Melrose, had beaten us to the camp and commandeered a well secluded spot we might have otherwise selected for ourselves. Instead we found ourselves a spot on the banks of the dry creek, surrounded with bird filled trees, the remnants of campfires and flies galore.

And speaking of fires, we discarded the firewood we have been carting around with us gathered at the lake just north of Tennant Creek, at Wilpena Pound Resort. There has been a total fire ban since the 15^th of this month, so it was just superfluous weight and volume in the cruiser.