Get trusty Ford Ranger Ute (tow vehicle) serviced - Check ✅
Have caravan (our home on wheels) wheel bearings & brakes checked out and various minor repairs completed - Check ✅
House-sitter arranged - Check ✅
Fill the vehicle with fuel and the caravan with food - Check ✅
ALL DONE - We were ready to roll!
Given the fact that it was the start of summer meant that places inland and northwards (one and the same when you set out from South Australia), would be too hot for man, woman and machine to be enjoyable (or even safe in the event of an outback breakdown). With that in mind, on Sunday December 16th we drove out of Adelaide to resume our journey setting out on a southeasterly heading towards the southernmost mainland state of Victoria. Our intended route was to follow the Victorian coastline in order to enjoy the cooling effect of the ocean. For the most part we did this except to give the city of Melbourne (population of ~ 4 million) a wide berth - no need to be towing a caravan through the middle of heavy city traffic.
With no particular place to be at any particular time we ambled along at our own pace. Do you remember the definition of Coddiwomple (the name we have given to our journey)? To refresh your memories, it is as follows:
Coddiwomple (verb): To travel in a purposeful manner towards an unknown or vague destination
Anyway, we found ourselves in a very nice camping area in the hills just a few kilometres outside of the town of Portland. This place was about 5 - 10 degrees cooler than anywhere else on the map and had everything we needed so we decided to stay here for Christmas and move on again on Boxing Day or thereabouts.
We enjoyed the birds and wallabies that lived in the surrounding forest and it was clear that they had become quite used to and comfortable with humans being in their patch. If you didn’t know better you would swear they have watches as they all knew just when to present themselves for some breakfast, lunch and dinner!
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| I think this carrot has gone straight to my hips! |
On Christmas Eve we cooked up a nice Christmas feast centred around a beautiful ham and vegetables with all of the fixings! A lovely outdoor meal that evening and again on Christmas Day (with leftovers for a couple more days again after that) was a good indication that we had done it right!
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| Christmas in the bush - 2018. Beautiful ham with all of the fixings! |
Between Christmas and New Year we left the coast and travelled inland a bit in order to avoid Melbourne and it's suburbs. An interesting campsite during this time was inside the rim of the crater of an extinct volcano (Mt. Franklin) - certainly hadn’t done that before!
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| Camped inside the crater rim of the extinct Mt. Franklin volcano |
When we first arrived we almost had the place to ourselves (as you can see in the photo above) which was very nice but that did not last long as the post-Christmas / pre-New Year holiday makers started to arrive. We broke camp and moved on to leave the revellers to their revelling!
A few days and a couple of camps later we were on the other side of Melbourne and back down on the coast. We thought about visiting the southernmost point on the Australian mainland, 'Wilson’s Promontory', however there was not a free nor paid for campsite available down there so we had to be content with a ‘drive-thru’ visit. Maybe we will try again at a different time of the year when it will be too cold for the majority of the masses.
In Australia, summer means bushfires and this year was no exception. We had hoped to do a couple of days of near-coast, i.e.: non-beachfront, bush camping in order to avoid the previously mentioned crowds and had not long had ourselves set-up in a very quiet bush location when we were visited by a couple of local forest management rangers. They informed us that weather forecasts for the next day and beyond were calling for +40℃ temperatures accompanied by strong northerly (read: ‘hot and dry’) winds. As such, we were told to be gone by 10am the next morning because the forest was to be closed to public access at that time due to the extreme risk of fire. We were up at first light and after a cup of coffee we were out of there. We really lucked out in two regards having left the fire danger zone:
- We found a great campsite - couldn't believe our luck, in a tiny town called Golden Beach on a stretch of coastline that is known as 90 mile beach, and;
- Later that afternoon, plumes of smoke that filled the sky and blotted out the sun could be seen rising from whence we had just come! That fire burned for several days.
More critter encounters at our next camp. This time it was an overly familiar/friendly goanna. He was a bit more than a metre long (I estimate about 4 and a half feet in the old language) and had far less fear of us than we had of him - click on the photo below to enlarge it and check out the claws on each foot as he was trying to get into our van!
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| After climbing onto our camp chairs he decided he wanted to go inside. |
It is nice to see the wildlife ‘up close and personal’ but also good when everyone maintains a degree of separation that is safe for all parties.
In addition to the camping and caravanning, Heather managed to get a good deal of metal detecting done. Amongst a myriad of finds including old pre-decimal coins, the oldest being a Queen Victoria Half Penny from 1878, was the hood ornament from a 1947 Ford Super Deluxe 8 sedan, and some old dog registration tags (see pics below).
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| H posing beside a shipwreck on 90 Mile Beach. Note: NO detecting done here just a nice photo-op! |
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| 1950/51 Dog Tag (Hole punched in bottom of tag means the dog was female) |
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| Hood ornament from a 1947 Ford Super Deluxe 8 Car |
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| Lasagne cooked on coals in a camp oven. We will definitely be making this one again! |
We also managed to visit two more of the bush pubs that feature in our Australian Bush Pubs book.
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| Heather outside of the Dargo Hotel in the Victorian 'High Country' |
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| Inside the Dargo Hotel getting our book signed by the Publican |
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| The Publican of the Commercial Hotel in Bendoc, VIC, signs his page in our Bush Pub book |
An update on the progress of our quest to visit all of the pubs featured in our book will once again be provided in the next blog to be posted.
Our Victorian road trip wrapped up a few days later just a few kilometres south of the NSW border. For those interested in the travel statistics associated with this ‘Victoria 2019’ portion of our journey, a map showing our route and stops along the way is provided below.
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| Our route and camp sites during our Victoria 2019 Coddiwomple |
A similar summary of our travels through the Australian state of New South Wales will be posted in a few days time. As a preview of what WTF? - Where are The Farrows? have been up to, I will reveal that we trekked from sea level to the summit of Australia’s highest peak and back down again! How many of you, dear readers, can say you have stood at the summit of any of the 7 continent’s highest peaks?
so lucky to be able to do this. wonderful
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