Thursday 29 June 2017

From this gorgeous tree in blazing fall colours you'd think we were home, in Ontario, in October. Well, we're not, it's May and we're in Clarendon, South Australia. Having stumbled upon this place, through serendipity, we were delighted by it and it did make us feel a little homesick, but, in a good way.


Clarendon is a small town in the Adelaide Hills, about 25–30 km south of the Adelaide city centre. The Clarendon Weir is located in the town area on the Onkaparinga River. We were on our mini road trip from Brisbane to Melbourne, via Adelaide and had just whizzed by Adelaide, promising to revisit and look at the city in more depth when we return this way later on. We were heading for one of the free campsites shown on our camping app and were stunned to find this little enclave, resplendent in colour and scenic beauty.


The weather was slightly cool (we had long sleeves and long pants on for the first time in months), but, sunny, dry and great for walking the small main street. There were only a few shops, including a wonderful bakery with a bench outside that was perfect for sitting on while stuffing your face with the old-fashioned, home-baked, goodies purchased inside. The houses were very unique and charming. These are just a few examples.




And hey, the birds weren't bad either!



We strolled back to the van, past a hillside vineyard and along the riverbank. It was a wonderful respite from road travel and one of the nicest places we've been to so far in Australia.


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Thursday 22 June 2017

Now that we are boat owners again, our plans for a lengthy road trip in Australia have been shortened somewhat. We are planning to bring the boat back to Australia from Malaysia in the July-October timeframe, but, haven't finalized dates yet. In the meantime, as we waited for our flight to Malaysia,  we had a few weeks available for a mini road trip. So, we left the Brisbane area with plans to do a loop west from Brisbane via Broken Hill, to Adelaide and then circle back along the south coast to Melbourne where we will leave the van.

First, we headed south along the coast to Port Macquarie, home of the renowned Port Mcquarie Koala Hospital. Most koalas simply pass through here, they are treated and then released. However, there are a few permanent residents that can never be released, like this koala, blinded by chlamydia. About 80% of all koalas are infected with chlamydia and yes it's the same variety that humans suffer from! Untreated in koalas, it has devastating consequences affecting the eyes and urogenital tract.



Koalas sleep most of the time and this enabled us to see them at very close range. When they're awake, they just munch on eucalyptus leaves and we saw them doing that too. Many of the koalas displayed in commercial operations are offered up to be held for photo-ops. None of that here, the koalas don't like being touched. It was enough just to observe these fascinating creatures.



After Port Macquarie, we headed inland, away from the coast. We were on a historic highway leading to the outback mining town of Broken Hill. This was going to be our first glimpse of the 'outback' and we were looking forward to a change of scene. The land started to level out and get drier. This was the view from our first inland campsite.


The next day, the land leveled out some more and became agricultural. We were surprised to see fields of cotton. They looked ready for harvesting.  It was a thrill to see small groups of very large emus just wandering along the field edges. 





Broken Hill was more sophisticated than we'd thought it was going to be. Reminders of an obviously wealthy past were present in some beautiful buildings still remaining.



The other side of a wealthy past was apparent at the somber and well-done miner's memorial, a monument to the horrific loss of life which brought wealth to the town.



Inside the memorial was a wall of memorial plaques. Each small plaque, decorated with a white rose, detailed a miner's death. There were many examples of extremely young men, dying horrible deaths.



Leaving Broken Hill, the land flattened out and now stretched endlessly far, far to the horizon.




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Sunday 11 June 2017

We decided that, before heading to Malaysia and our new boat, we wanted to have at least a couple of weeks touring in the campervan which we had just fitted out. We had to hang around the Brisbane area for another week while waiting for an appointment to have our clutch replaced (don't ask!) and were casting about for somewhere interesting to go. We thought we'd exhausted all the tourism opportunities around Brisbane, but, were we ever wrong. After a bit of study, we found a few gems close by that seemed to warrant a visit. So, even though the weather wasn't great, with quite a bit of rain, much-needed in drought-stricken Queensland and cooler temperatures which were very welcome after the heat wave of February and March, it didn't dampen our enthusiasm and we headed out.

First, we visited Lamington National Park. High in the mountains (hills really) you could still see Brisbane way off in the distance, but, it was like we had landed in another world. As we are now in the off-season, the park was mostly deserted of people, but, full of wildlife. Crimson Rosellas flitted in the trees around the van. They are a spectacular sight.


This little bird seemed almost tame and hopped right up to us.


The rather ugly brush turkeys were a little too bold with one jumping right into the open door of our van to have a look.


It was delightful to wake up in the morning to find around fifty wallabies, many with joeys, nibbling on the campground grass all around the van!


Later in the day, we did the 'tree top walk'. This necessitated climbing a ladder, surrounded with a metal cage, high into the treetops. The ascent wasn't as difficult as it sounds.



The view from the treetops, thirty meters up from the ground, was worth the climb.


We did a few more forest walks in the area and encountered waterfalls and forest pools.




Even the trees were interesting with examples of trees being slowly strangled by strangler fig vines and even trees with buttresses!





Next, we headed up to the Noosa 'Everglades'. We hired a canoe and went out for the day into the mangroves. Rain again, but, we saw some wonderful birds, including brilliant purple kingfishers and we enjoyed the peace and quiet of the waterway immensely.

After our canoe trip, we headed back towards Brisbane and rounded out our tour with a scenic drive in the Glass Mountains. The day was cool, but, we did the hike up Mount Ngungun anyway.  It started to rain once we got to the summit, but, the view from the top, across the vineyards, was very nice.













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Thursday 1 June 2017

One morning we decided to walk into Brisbane from the caravan park we'd been staying at. It was about eight km along an excellent walking and biking path that wends its way along river banks and through picturesque suburbs. It was a delightful day and we enjoyed many sights along the way.

Before we even left the caravan park, we spotted these incredibly colourful rainbow lorikeets. It's always exciting to see them, but, usually they fly so fast it's just a glimpse. We were lucky to spot this one feeding in a bush.



There were many well-cared for, charming 'Queenslander' houses to enjoy along the way.









A very large flying fox (bat) colony flanked the riverbanks at one point. I think most Australians consider them vermin, but, we still find them fascinating and rather beautiful. This species was red-headed!


Once we reached Brisbane an unexpected piece of Canadiana showed up.



Once we reached the downtown the street art was fun.



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