Trekkin

25 August 2022 – Thursday – Rottnest Island

Another early start & breakfast at 7am at the Lontara, part of the Samphire Resort, we enjoy a table in the open air with the sun warming us as we eat. We catch the hop-on hop-off bus at 9am & enjoy the views as we travel the 11km to the West End where we stop for a walk along the boardwalk at Fish Hook Bay at Cape Vlamingh. With the sun out today the scenery has totally changed, the colours of the ocean are amazing & it is very pleasant enjoying the views. At Fish Hook Bay an Osprey has a nest, a large pile of sticks on a rocky outcrop over the ocean. Next to the boardwalk is an anchor from a boat wrecked here in 1984, a Japanese tuna boat, the Kiryo Maru.

We then walk along the track to Cathedral Rocks to view the seal colony that live there, the seals are cavorting in the water just out past the Cathedral Rocks. It is a brisk walk back & the next bus has just arrived & waits for us to take us on to Marjorie Bay where we spot another Osprey nest, this one with a chick in it that we can see. We walk along the Narrow Neck Road to Rock Bay bus stop & catch the next bus that comes past.

Our next stop is the City of York Bay, the place where the ship of the same name ran aground in 1899, around 200m offshore. Its anchor is on display outside the Visitor Centre at the wharf. We walk down to the beach & another group of people walk onto the beach for a swim, the water is a bit chilly for us. It is a steep walk back up to the road & we have a look at Catherine Bay as we wait for the next bus. We take the bus all the way back into town & have lunch before catching the bus at 1pm & heading off again.

Parker Point is our stop this time & we enjoy the scenery as we walk around to Little Salmon Bay then to Salmon Bay. The day is starting to warm up.  There are lots of big King Skinks (lizards) sunning themselves on the bitumen road. AT Salmon Bay there are a few people in having a swim & a snorkel, they say the water is cold. At Salmon Point we spot another Osprey nest perched on a large rock in the water & watch as an osprey brings a fish in its talon for the chick in the nest. From Salmon Bay we get great views down the coast to Cape Vlamingh & also to the Wadjemup Lighthouse.

Onto the bus again & stop next at the lighthouse road, the walk up is steep but the views are worthwhile, from one end of the island to the other & across to Perth. Besides the imposing white lighthouse there are a number of other large buildings on the hill, relics from the defence systems from the Second World War. The walk down is a little easier & we have some time to catch our breath as we wait for the bus. There are people on bicycles peddling past on a regular basis, I am glad we are catching the bus, cycling looks hard work.

The next bus we catch takes us back around West Point then all the way back to the settlement, then back to our room & rest a little until it is time to walk to Bathurst Point Lighthouse for the sunset. The skies are clear blue & lots of other people join us to watch the sun set over the Indian Ocean. Some whales provide some additional interest for us as they swim past.  The sunset is absolutely beautiful with amazing colour.

Quokkas are out everywhere as we walk back in the twilight. The baby quokkas are especially cute & are also plentiful. We stop at the Rottnest Hotel for dinner & around our feet inside the hotel quokkas are foraging for food scraps. The couple we sat near last night at Isola also sit at the next table tonight & we end up chatting again until well after our meals are finished & most others have left. We walk back to the Samphire Resort with them, they are staying on the same floor as us & we say our farewells to them. We walked 12.7 kilometres today & our legs are telling us we need some rest. Another great day.

24 August 2022 – Perth to Rottnest Island

Up at 6am for breakfast at the airport hotel then a taxi into the Barrack Street Jetty with a very chatty driver from Afghanistan. The Barrack Square is surrounded by nice architecturally designed buildings with a stunning looking modern bell tower in the middle of the square, a stunning modern interpretation of a ship. As we wait for the ferry to Rottnest Island we meet & chat with a friendly Perth family, originally from Canberra living in the suburb next to us & their daughter went to the same school as our son, a small world.

It takes around an hour for the ferry to motor down the beautiful Swan River to the mouth at Fremantle. There are some very expensive houses and boats all along the shoreline. We chat to our new found friends all the way across on the ferry & before we know it we tie up at the wharf in Thomson Bay at Rottnest Island. It is only a short walk to our resort motel and we check in early at around 11am, the bags get delivered by the ferry company to the resort. We set off to explore the island.

The island has a hop-on hop-off bus and we spend an hour on the bus as it takes us on a long loop around Rottnest Island, the scenery is stunning with lots of small bays, beaches & intervening limestone cliffs. Back at Thomson Bay we call into the Dome Cafe for lunch, salt & pepper squid & fish & chips, for a change – ah so nice to eat fresh sea food again. The Dome Cafe has two very interesting domes built into the ceiling & painted with a globe of the world inside each dome, most unusual & very nice. Back to our hotel for a short rest after lunch while waiting for our luggage to arrive.

Rottnest Island is known for its population of Quokkas, a small marsupial kangaroo, very cute, inquisitive & very used to people. All the cafes, shops & stores have anti quokka doors so that the small animals don’t go inside the buildings, but some sneek through if you are not quick to get in. We see lots of Quokka as we walk around the settlement exploring the historical buildings dating from the 1800s when the island was used as a prison for Aboriginal men, also for the production of salt, lighthouses & Pilot Boats to escort shipping into the port of Fremantle. We spend all afternoon wandering amongst the historic buildings plus the vast number of old holiday houses. It is winter currently and there are not that many people on the island, however, in summer we are told all the accommodation is booked out & the island is crowded with families & hundreds of small boats moored in the sheltered bays. We finish at the Bathurst Point Lighthouse and are rewarded with beautiful views over Pinky Beach and over the Indian ocean to the north, with the tented Eco-Village overlooking Pinky Beach where our new found friends we met at the ferry terminal are staying.

The Bathurst Point Lighthouse was built after the wreck of the ship “City of York” in 1899 on the reefs of Rottnest Island. The anchor recovered from this ship is on display in front of the Visitor Information Centre at the start of the wharf. A cairn below the lighthouse commemorates the first known landing from a European on Rottnest Island from a Dutch ship in 1658, they named the island Rottnest (meaning rat nest in Dutch) Island.

It is a long walk back to our motel & we get back around 5pm then prepare ourselves for dinner at the nearby Isola Restaurant overlooking Thomson Bay. The Isola is a nicely laid out Italian Restaurant with full length floor to ceiling windows, the views are amazing. The Isola is staffed mainly by Italians with Italian chefs & wait staff. The waitress who served us comes from a small city, Latina near Roma, the place where Tereza & family spent 9 months in a refugee camp before coming to Australia, what a small world. Next to us another couple sat & overhearing us talking to the waitress about Italy started to talk to us & comparing places they visited while in Italy. They ordered (without knowing) the same meals & even the same Italian red wine as we did. We had a lovely chat with them, as the lady’s family, who came from Lithuania, had similar experiences as Tereza with refugee camps overseas & in Australia. The food is delicious Italian fare & we finish the night with an Affogato & very full stomachs. The short walk back to our motel helps to make us feel a little more comfortable. Another great day.

23 August 2022 Canberra to Perth

Our son & grandson picked us up around 6pm to take us to the airport for our scheduled 7.45pm Qantas flight, what a nice start to a holiday. Check-in & security was easy & quick & the Boeing 737 was surprisingly full. We landed at 10.30pm Perth time, very bumpy coming in to land, Canberra time it was 12.30pm. The baggage was quick off the plane then a courtesy bus to our airport hotel where we fell into bed, a long day & well past our bedtime.

11/6/2022 – Saturday – 603km

An early start from the Rotary Ground at Echuca & we stop in town at the 3 Galah Café for breakfast, people are just starting to set up tents for a market day near the Paddle Wheeler Museum across the road. We then head out to Deniliquin on the way home to Canberra. The road is a major highway, nice & flat as is the surrounding countryside, full of sheep & crops, most of the traffic is heading the other way & we pass through Deniliquin fairly quickly.

We then turn off the main road & follow some back country roads through to Conargo then on to Jerilderie. Some of the road is only one lane of bitumen & we need to put the car onto the gravel to pass the cars coming from the other direction. Thankfully there are not too many cars & the 90 kilometres only takes around an hour to drive. Jerilderie is a nice looking town as we drive slowly through it then turns off towards Urana. More back country roads & more low flat land with long straight roads. Urana is another hour on & is a small town with cross roads.

Lockhart is the next major town & the main street is very well maintained & looks like it would have looked in the early 1900s, with lots of fresh paint & nice facades on the buildings. There are a lot of great looking sculptures around town, some of horses pulling wagons & other random items. There is a walking track just outside with a series of small sculptures placed along the track. This seems like a nice small town.

It is another 40 minutes before we reach Wagga Wagga and the first of any hills since we left Echuca this morning. We find our way, thanks to GPS, to Tereza’s brother’s place, we have not been to their place for a long time due to Covid.  Shirley is waiting for us with a smile & a bowl of soup followed by hot pasta dish – all very nice.  Lucky for us Shirley’s kitchen wasn’t closed because once again we arrived after 2pm. We eat & chat then more chatting to catch up with all family things. All too soon we are on the road again, around 4pm, so that it will not be too late when we get home.

The light stays with us for a surprisingly long time & it does not get dark until Yass. The traffic on the Highway is light & the driving is easy. After Yass the road becomes a narrow normal road & the oncoming headlights are a little blinding, some more so than others. There seems to be a lot of traffic coming away from Canberra.

We finally pull into our driveway a bit after 7pm after 603km of driving for the day. It is cold, but that is winter in Canberra.  Our neighbour, Anji looked after our house & even left us some lovely pumpkin soup, it went down well & appreciated.  She is an angel.  We left the unpacking for tomorrow.  Another great day & wonderful holiday.

A total of 5,359 kilometres for our holiday.

10/6/2022 – Friday – 278km

An overcast sky & light misty rain as we departed Halls Gap in the Grampian Ranges this morning. There are masses of kangaroos grazing on the grasslands around the town & just after we pass the town boundary a line of 5 emus slowly ambled across the road in front of us. I had to stop the car & wait as they slowly walked across the road. A bit further on there were lots more emus grazing in paddocks on both sides of the road. The country quickly changed to cleared flat grazing & cropping land with a tinge of green.

The old gold mining city of Stawell is the first town we pass through & there are lots of nice old buildings, the old fire station is interesting with a lookout on the roof, we have not seen one like that before. The GPS guided us through Stawell with the few twists & turns, the signposting is not that good & we were glad for the spoken directions, thank goodness for technology.

St Arnaud is the next big town & we stop to have a look at the silo mural art, again this is very good, the artists are amazing with their use of spray paint. After Logan we turn off to Inglewood & travel a lot of one lane bitumen road through some very isolated countryside. It is very pretty hilly country that is lightly forested & fortunately we did not meet too many cars coming the other direction as we had wheels off on the dirt on the side of the road when we had to pass each other. After Inglewood the road was narrow again until the turn-off to Serpentine.  After Serpentine we travelled on narrow one lane roads again across the backblocks of country Victoria. Thank goodness for GPS. The roads are now flat & very straight with sheep, cattle & crops on both sides.

In Echuca we can only stay in the caravan park if we book in for three nights because it is a long week end.  We luck it into the Rotary overnight camping spot next to Campaspe River, no electricity or toilet/bathroom facility, but our caravan has it all.  We set up then head into town. We park outside the Beechworth Bakery & decide to have a late lunch (once again it is after 2pm) pies & coffee again. After lunch we walk along the old main street & come to the Echuca historical wharf area where the old paddle steamers operate from. We walk through the museum & then out onto the old wharf, where we see the old paddle steamer “Canberra” rounding the bend in the river with the paddles churning the water & the steam engine chugging away. The boat whistle blew a few times as it turned to berth at the wharf. We also had a look at the steam engines on display & operating at the old sawmill site out the back of the museum. Back to camp & I attend to a few bills & Tereza goes for a walk along the banks of the Campaspe River taking a few photos of the river & having a chat with some of the fellow campers. We drive back into town for dinner & find a park outside the Echuca Distillery, they specialise in distilling gin. We had a look at the menu in the window & decide to go in & try even though neither of us drink gin. We order roast duck & also pork belly bites with a taster of 3 types of gin. The food is absolutely delicious & the gin is tasty. We also order an affogato for dessert, again delicious. We are surprised that there are not that many customers. Another great day.

9/6/2022 – Thursday – 218km

Back into the Grampians this morning for a look at the places we did not have time for yesterday. The scenery is stunning, huge rock cliff faces & deep rocky valleys filled with trees. We turn off & climb Mount Victory Road before turning onto the appropriately named Mount Difficult Road & climb more up into the clouds. The drive through the forest is stunning, the trunks of the trees stand out as a fire has been through recently & the understory has not had time to recover. Boroka Lookout is supposed to have a stunning view over the surrounding countryside, we are clouded in, all we see is white mist & a very long drop from the cliff top viewing platforms we are standing on. It is also raining & cold at 5C degrees.

Onward & off to see Mackenzie Falls & Broken Falls on the Wartook Road through more spectacular scenery. The walk from the carpark is only around 700 metres to the viewing platform & the photos do not do justice to the view, the falls are very pretty & tumble a long way over a number of different drops into the deep gorge below. The walk to the bottom of the falls we decide against, there are warnings of people dying or getting seriously injured either on the way down or back up. Only for the very fit, young & adventurous. We should have visited this place 10 years ago, we were fitter then.

We then follow the Mackenzie Valley down, more stunning scenery & we pass the Zumsteins Picnic Area, it must be very popular in summer as it is very large, only two cars there today, the weather is fairly miserable. We reach flat land again & the forest gives way to open pastures full of sheep, crops & sun shine.

The city of Horsham is around 40km away so we decide to drive there for a look, we have never been there before & the roads are flat & straight so the drive does not take too long. We find the main street & a parking spot then look for a place for lunch, it is nearly 2pm (once again we miss the lunch time). A baker shop seems to be busy so we go in & order a few pies & a coffee, then eat inside, I don’t want to share this pie with any kookaburra (ha, ha). The pies are good, tasting even better than the Halls Gap pies. Lunch over we drive past the silo art site & take some photos then back to the Grampians.

As the Grampian Ranges come into view they just rise up out of the plains, with the western sun shining on the flanks they look spectacularly beautiful. This is such a different view than when we were driving away from them (naturally). We climb back up the Mackenzie River valley then decide to drive out to the Boroka Lookout again (Ron the forever optimist), the sun is mostly shining now & it is not raining. All looks good until we get to the lookout, everything is still white & we leave disappointed that we missed the view, however, the drive is still wonderful. Back to the camp & I take a walk out to the large grassed area near the creek, it is full of kangaroos feeding & take no notice of me as I walk amongst them. I walk back past the camp kitchen & am amazed, it is the best I have seen yet, complete with a lounge area with wood fire & leather couches. Most of the caravan parks have been really good but this one tops them all. Time for a shower then out to dinner at the Flame Brothers Restaurant. Great service, friendly waiter from Spain (as we had a 6 o’clock booking we were almost the only ones so we had a lovely chat with the young waiter about the places we should visit in Spain & his experiences traveling around Australia & how much he likes it here), great food,  nice & warm from the fire. We have full bellies when we leave. Another great day.

8/6/2022 – Wednesday – 178km

Packed & off before the rain.  On our way north to the Grampian Ranges. Most of the countryside is rolling plains filled with either sheep or cattle grazing on the green pastures, we don’t notice much in the way of crops. Our GPS guides us on the back roads & it is not until we near the town of Dunkeld that the Grampian Ranges come into view, with Mount Sturgeon & neighbour Mount Abrupt looming out of the mist & cloud as the rain clears. After Dunkeld we start climbing the flanks of Mount Abrupt & we are in the Grampian Ranges, what a difference, with masses of trees & huge mountains looming over the road as we twist & turn along the snaking road. We only come across twelve other cars on the journey to Halls Gap, there is not very much traffic on the road at all.

Lake Bellfield comes into view as we approach Halls Gap & the valley opens up & we see some open spaces again near the village. The van park is just below the dam wall so we turn off & book in for a couple of nights & set up camp. There is only 4 caravans including ours but the park is fully booked for the coming long weekend.  It is a beautiful park with heated swimming pool, there are heated ensuite bathrooms, something we really appreciate in this cold weather. Next it is in to Halls Gap, about another 4 kilometres on, for a little bit of shopping.

In Halls Gap township there is a small string of shops so we park & walk along the street, most of the shops are closed so we step into the grocery store & stock up on a few food items. We then walk over to where a small flock of parrots is entertaining some people along the banks of Stony Creek & we discover a few more shops. We look at these & most are open, including a bakery so we call in & get some pies for lunch (lucky for us they only had a few because once again we are late for lunch, it is after 2pm) & sit at the covered tables near the creek bank , it is the same temperature as yesterday but no wind & actually the sun is shining & it is quite pleasant. There are signs on the table to not feed the birds.

I hold my pie in its bag & am just taking a mouthful when – whoosh – a Kookaburra has swooped down and taken about a third of the pie out of my mouth & hand without touching me at all. It scared the daylights out of me. It lands at my feet with its trophy in its beak & is then swarmed by all sorts of other birds, including another Kookaburra, all looking for a free meal. Tereza & I gather up what is left & beat a hasty retreat to another set of benches with better roof cover & finish our pies, all the time under the watchful eye of a Kookaburra sitting on the overhead wires. What a shame Tereza didn’t have the camera ready to have made a video of it.

Next is a drive up into the nearby Wonderland Range. The scenery is breathtaking with one amazing vista after another. We complete the Wonderland Loop drive, stopping at a few carparks on the way to have some short walks to look at the amazing scenery. We conclude with a drive down the one way Silverband Road back to Lake Bellfield where we stop & walk along the length of the dam wall. Fabulous views from here as well & as the sun appears then dips below the mountains we get some amazing views with the light shining off the trees & the damp rocky mountainsides.

A very short drive back to camp, shower (heated private cubicles no less) then cheese & bikkies. Another great day.

7/6/2022 – Tuesday – ?km

Off for a drive to Warrnambool first thing this morning, only around half an hour drive from Port Fairy. We go to the Flagstaff Hill Maritime Village, a museum focussing on the maritime heritage of Warrnambool & the surrounding coastline. We arrive in time for a guided tour by a woman (Pat) dressed in period costume, the tour starts from the Loch Ard exhibit downstairs next to the centrepiece of the museum, a magnificent large pottery peacock that survived the shipwreck. Pat told us the story of the wreck of the Loch Ard & some of the exhibits on display before taking us on a tour of the original lighthouse keeper’s cottage furnished to the period. The original lighthouse keeper had 9 children & the assistant keeper had 11 children, how they all fitted into this tiny divided cottage I have no idea. We climbed up into the lighthouse & enjoyed a great view over the harbour & the coast in both directions. The lighthouse is still in use today.

We then walk down the cobbled pathway into the constructed village, built in the style of the mid 1800s time & furnished with the fittings & products of that time, it is very well done. Slate roof tiles recovered from a nearby shipwreck have been used to roof some of the buildings. On the created waterfront is a pub plus a shipwright & sailmakers building, all furnished appropriately. The shipwright builds boats in the shed, with one wooden boat part complete. It is past lunchtime before we realise, we are so engrossed with this place.

We drive a couple of blocks into town & find a café for lunch, then drive around the Warrnambool harbour for a look, get out near the island that has Maremme dogs protecting the breeding colony of Little Penguins, then dash back to the car before the rain gets too heavy. Back to the Maritime Village & Museum to finish off looking around & before we know it, it is 5pm & the museum closes. Another drive around some more waterfront, this time the Hopkins River mouth & some of the parks upstream, very nice.  We then head across to the Pickering Point Lookout & the Thunder Point Lookout for some more angry sea views before it gets too dark. Back to the same café as lunch for a light dinner then back to the museum for the night time light show.

Good thing we are rugged up, we walk back down the cobblestone path through the village in the night with our lantern, it feels even colder than when we were here earlier today. We have a truly immersive experience, the village is used as the backdrop for a sound & light show, there is fog, there is wind & there is rain, all produced as part of the show, plus the added natural enhancements of cold wind & rain. Our seats shake & rock at appropriate times as the show is projected by lasers onto a sheet of water in the small lake before us. It is all really well done, telling us the stories of the volcanic formations of the landscape, early whaling & the shipwreck story of the Loch Ard. The long walk back up the cobblestone hill in the cold wind makes the warmth of the museum that much more welcoming. Another half hour drive back to our camp at Port Fairy. Another great day, it would have been greater if the weather was warmer.

6/6/2022 – Monday – ?km

Oh what a night!  The wind, rain & even some hail kept us awake half the night.  Big gusts of wind would rock & shake the caravan. We are nice & cosy, we have our warm doona at night (we don’t have the heater on), otherwise when we are here we do appreciate the heater. The wind abated somewhat so we had a sleep in until 9 am.

Dull & boring stuff this morning, it is washing day so we attend to that first ( rain or no rain we are running out of clothes) & use the dryers in the camp laundry (for the first time since we are on the road) as it is still so wet & windy to hang out, the clothes will never dry. Then we head off exploring Port Fairy again, admiring some more of the sculptures around town & heading to the river mouth. It is still very cold, very windy & wet, with the waves pounding against the rocks. We explore more of the foreshore westwards & admire the rugged beauty of this coastline. It is such a shame that it is so bitterly cold & we can’t go for some nice walks. One of the gun batteries is next on the agenda, these were built in the 1860s overlooking the port entrance to deter a feared Russian invasion. Two of the original guns are still mounted on the metal gun carriages with two more, older guns getting readied for display under some shelters. They are very big guns.

In to town for a walk around admiring some of the old stone buildings, Port Fairy must have been prosperous in the 1800s looking at some of the impressive large stone buildings that are in abundance. Lunch was next on the agenda so we popped into the old mill house café that had a fire going & sat at a table next to the fire to warm up. Ron had a big schnitzel & salad. Tereza a big steak sandwich, no dinner tonight.  After lunch there was a bit more walking around the main shopping area before we started driving around again admiring the old & some new buildings. The Moyne River that the town is built around is very pretty with wharves & boats tied up along the banks. Back to the van we played cards & read for a while.  Another great day.

5/6/2022 – Sunday – 216km

Thankfully no rain as we pack camp this morning. During the night there was a fierce hail storm that woke us up rocking the Karavan & hammering on the roof. The campers next to us had to get up at midnight to secure their annexe. The drive from Mount Gambier towards Nelson in Victoria is pleasant with rolling green pastures grazed by lots of fat sheep. We passed a few big pine plantations as we passed Caveton.

Nelson is a small town on the Glenelg River, a sleepy fishing village with not much happening this morning. We pull into Nelson & stop near the Post Office Park so that we could get out & stretch our legs. We chat to some fellow travellers whom also left Mount Gambier this morning. Back in the car we pass seemingly endless pine plantations on both sides of the road. We turn off the Princess Highway at Gorae West towards Cape Bridgewater & drive through rolling green pastures on both sides of the road full of fat sheep again. The looming wind turbines at Cape Bridgewater now start to dominate the skyline & when we get to the small village of Cape Bridgewater we can’t believe our eyes, there is a group of mad surfers in the water learning how to surf in the sheltered bay. The car is reading 8 degrees & the wind is blowing hard.

We drive through the forest of wind turbines to reach the carpark at Cape Bridgewater, the other people there are fully rugged up & hunched over against the strong wind. We rug up & venture first to the Blowhole, we cannot see the Blowhole working but the waves crashing against the cliffs are enormous & there is sea spray everywhere. It is so cold & very windy. We then turn with our backs into the wind & walk along the cliff face to the Petrified Forest. This is interesting, however still very cold & very windy. It is not actually a petrified forest, it is caused by small pools of water leeching down through the limestone, dissolving the limestone then being filled with sand. Still very interesting to see. We struggle back into the wind & quickly turn the seat heaters on in the car, we are cold. The waves are pounding onto the beaches of Bridgewater Bay & the strong wind is picking up the sea spray blurring the view.

The small city of Portland is on the road out & we drive along the seafront to view the large working port. The town ships out woodchips, aluminium ingots & cement, there was one empty ship out at sea anchored & two ships loading in port. We call into the Information Centre/Museum on the harbour foreshore & have coffee & cake before exploring the small museum. Prominent on display in the foyer is the skeleton of a sperm whale that washed up on a beach nearby. Also prominent is the Portland lifeboat that rescued so many survivors from the wreck of the steamship Admella in August 1859, there a few pieces of memorabilia from the wreck plus a stone plaque commemorating those that died, the survivors & the rescuers. There are also a number of interesting personal stories from the wreck. The museum also tells the stories of whaling & fishing that were the catalyst for the start of the settlement of Portland.

As we leave the information centre the small Portland Community Tramway is rolling down the tracks on the clifftop behind with some tourists. We drive around the old port area & admire some of the old stone buildings such as the Court House, Town Hall & Police Station as well as some glorious old restored hotels. It is raining again so we decide to travel on to Port Fairy, rather than set up in the rain & wind on an exposed cliff top at Portland.

The road around the foreshore from Portland was a nice scenic drive, right on the water edge of the Southern Ocean. No rain & even the wind has abated due to the sheltering escarpment next to the road. We re-joined the Princess Highway & followed it the short distance into Port Fairy. We drove around the foreshore to the mouth of the river & to our amazement we saw a man walk on water.  We decided to stay for a few nights in this lovely place. The van park is right on the Moyne River & has a number of great wood carvings from big logs & tree stumps, they look good, particularly the whale. We set up camp for the night & settle in.  Tereza cooked lovely meatballs & vegetables, it just hit the spot on a cold night.  Another great day.