Awaking this morning, we were greeted by a panorama lit in the dim pastel watercolour hues of a grey cloud shrouded sky. It was if Mother Nature was reminding us that our travels through the outback had reached their crescendo. Even our view of the horizon was foreshortened by the black peaks of the Flinders Ranges spreading out broadly before us as we cruised through the outskirts of Port Augusta.

Turning to travel south from Port Augusta, Shazza decided to take us on a scenic touring route, enthralled no doubt at being asked to actually compute a route more challenging than what has become her usual instructions to drive without deviation for 300KM or more to reach our destination. I blindly followed the purple line inscribed upon her digital screen, swinging off of the highway onto a series of bone jarring secondary roads that bounced and wound their way tiringly, up, down, around and through the landscape. The rough and tumble plains of the outback were replaced today with bucolic pastoral fields, all neatly tilled and planted out with crops that were beyond our means to identify. Along the way, we passed through numerous quaint little villages, filled with even quainter little sandstone cottages, spirals of grey smoke gently wafting from their chimneys and main streets resplendent with charming stores sporting timbered window frames and wide verandahs in scenes reminiscent of a long forgotten yesteryear. The area we were travelling through was the Clare Valley Wine Region, and an unexpected route to our plotted destination nestled within the Barossa Valley. Had I have realised that we would be forging this path, I would have allotted some time to explore some of the many local wineries. Not stopping does however provide us with a liberal excuse to return some other time.

It was still only early in the afternoon when we rolled into the town of Tanunda, the home of the caravan park in which we have booked ourselves for a few nights stay. No thanks to Shazza, whose route calculating skills didn’t extend to finding the precise location of the caravan park, we finally found the driveway, checked in and spirited the rig around to our site. With well over a hundred sites here, I find it mind numbingly inane that they park everyone together in a small cluster of vans in such a way that the back bumper bar of our van now sits within inches of the rear of the van behind, while our drawbar threatens to impinge on the road way. That said, apart from the sites not being overly well designed for the lengthier vans such as our own, everything else appears quite suitable. We have enough room at least to unfurl our awning, to which we have attached the canvas walls of the annex to give us extra living space, as well as being able to park ‘The Beast’ alongside. Directly adjacent is the camping area, a wide expanse of lush grass, presently vastly unoccupied, which will provide a great place to give the dogs a run, while the other camp amenities are all within close proximity. In all, it’s not bad as far as caravan parks go.

We managed to get the van set up and sorted in record time, giving us enough time to take the very short drive back into the township, where we were able to collect armfuls of glossy brochures from the extremely knowledgeable and helpful staff at the information centre, on what to do around the area as well as further afield. Time also permitted having a quick look up and down the main street. While not a lot here, there is enough to suffice for the few nights we will be staying on.

While it had been rather cold all day, an icy chill quickly permeated the air as the sun descended, which saw us heading back to the comfort of the van, where we are plugged into a permanent supply of electricity (Although we have tripped the circuit twice already as we tried to run every high powered heat producing device we have with us, all at the one time. Lesson learned.), meaning that we can fire up the heater to give us the bit of overnight comfort that we’ve been yearning for. Also having returned to techno-lisation, I can once again provide you with the updates I am sure you all crave, although with nothing that gave us pause to photograph, there was only a single photograph to chart our progress (hence the word heavy, picture lite entry today). Even the sunset lost its photographic lustre today, surrounded as we are by hills rather than a photogenic tree lined, distant horizon.

Todays Only Pic.

Although, as I sit here now, in the closed in confines of the tin can, I am already missing the wide-open spaces, the nightly campfires and not feeling the constant apprehensive need to check my emails every few minutes. Bec on the other hand, not so much. She’s in bed as I write this, feeling rather worse for ware with some sort of savage tummy bug that has worn her our and already seen her dashing for the bathroom on several occasions. With luck it won’t hang around and we will be good to go once more in the morning, but I don’t think she is missing the prospect of camping out in the cold, in the middle of nowhere. Not tonight anyway.

Until next time, have fun, stay safe and don’t forget to write.