Thursday 12 May 2016

Half-lap Day 10: Clare -> Flinders Ranges

It rained a bit overnight, and then continued to drizzle on and off throughout the morning as we packed up. I got up early and blogged and checked email etc (sitting in the car as we hadn’t put the annex up for a 1 night stay) then packed up what I could while the others were still asleep. When Tony woke up he rigged up a tarp between the car and the tent for us to sit under to have breakfast. While they were eating the kids and Tony played Grandma’s Undies (where you ask questions and the answer always has to be ‘Grandma’s undies’ and no one is allowed to laugh) and ‘I went to the shop and I bought…’ memory game. They started with 1 and were up to about 15 items (1 shoe, 2 elephants etc) when they stopped. Caitlin then practiced some gymnastics and the others ran around and then they played ‘Why are you late?’ and ‘Dumbledore’ – some of Caitlin’s youth theatre games.

Pack up was a little tricky because of the rain, but we eventually got it all sorted and on our way. As we headed north the rain started to ease. We drove over one very long stretch of roadworks which was slow going, and we passed several large harvesters being towed by massive tractors. The terrain changed a lot as we travelled – out of wine country and back to cleared pastures with lots of sheep or grain, then low hardy looking trees, then lower grey/green bushes which made the hills look like they were covered in hair.  We saw several wild emus, including 2 who were crossing the road and we had to slow down for. Lots of wallabies, kangaroos and wallaroos too.

We stopped in Jamestown to grab fuel and groceries, and had a quick look at the river that flows through the middle of town, and has a fountain in the middle of it. The pedestrian bridges across the water were really well designed and attractive too. From there we headed to Orroroo, which my dad had (rightly) thought we would enjoy because the name has only 2 distinct letters, with 4 Os and 3 r’s. Everyone thought it was worth stopping at taking photos of us with the entry sign. The buildings through the town were beautiful too, very old and ornate – although there were hardly any people around, all the towns we drove through felt a bit deserted.

We also saw many many ruins of stone houses and barns – I’d really love to know more of the history of this area, as every farm seemed to have ruined buildings on it. As we drove we listened to Wild Born – the first of the Spirit Animal series, another book which is keeping us all intrigued.

As we neared the Flinders Ranges the terrain became rockier and the hills higher. I was very excited and also a bit anxious – my anxiety always increases when we go somewhere that I REALLY want to see – I worry that the others won’t like it and will be annoyed with me for taking us there, or that it won’t be as good as I was hoping and I’ll be disappointed, or that no one will want to do any of the cool things to do…. Once we saw the ranges though I felt much more relaxed, excited to finally be here (I’ve wanted to come here for a very long time) and happy that I could enjoy my time here. Tony and I were increasingly impressed at the red layers of rock in the ranges around us.

We stopped at the Visitor Centre and looked at pictures of animals we might find and at some of the walks we could do (kids are happy to do easy walks but don’t want to do another hard one…) then carried on through the park to Upalinna Homestead. Mija met us at her gate and gave us a map to the campground – Upalinna is a sheep farm which has an area set up for bush camping, only $15 a night. It was fun chatting to her and seeing her animals – black chickens, golden chickens, a dog and a cat – exactly what we’ve got at home! We headed over to the campsite and were able to pick the site with a view straight across to the ranges – I was so relieved, as I’d started to worry that by staying out of the National Park we wouldn’t have the full experience of being at the Flinders Ranges.


It was a bit of a challenge to find a flat enough space for our tent, then when we put it up we discovered that the tent had shifted on it’s poles a little (probably during the storm on Monday) and so the poles were not lining up properly, and combined with the slope it was hard to get it tight and flat. Caitlin and I had similar problems with the annex while Tony cooked tea and LiAM chopped wood. Eventually we had everything set up well enough, ate spaghetti bol for tea, then into bed to read Brisingr. It was a cold night so we snuggled with hot water bottles and were happy to go to bed as soon as we could.

(I'll try to get back to this post and upload some photos once I've got them on the computer)

No comments:

Post a Comment