Salix Sepulcralis: Heading South it gets Colder

Many of the "highways" in Australia have names, in addition to numbers. When we left Purple Pear, we got on highway 84 heading west, also called the Golden Highway. The scenery had completely changed over from sub-tropical to eucalypt forest/coast, now to a much dryer, Mediterranean or central California look. Wineries, citrus groves and racehorse farms lined the roadsides.

Daylight began to fade when we had gotten as far as Dunedoo, where we camped for the night. Most towns, even the little ones, have caravan parks. This one was right on the highway, and as we set up camp we heard trucks passing by at regular intervals. The camp kitchen had a kettle though, so there would be no need to fire up the wood-burning camp stove for coffee/tea in the morning. We slept well, despite the chilly temps, and have no idea whether the road noise continued all night.

In the morning we really started to hit our stride as far as breaking camp. It reminded me of our Alaska trip last fall. We were packed up in what seemed like a few minutes, and on the road again. At Dubbo, we headed further south on Highway 20, the Sturt Highway. The drive was scenic and interesting, with lots of sheep, cows and horses in the fields. Traffic was thinner than along the coast, so I even took the wheel for a shift.

Note what side of the car I am sitting on...

We stopped for the night in a little town called Hay. We parked in the downtown area, where there were a few people about, and found a visitor Information kiosk with maps and the locations of a few caravan parks. We decided to get dinner in town. This is definitely beef country so we had steak and all the trimmings. When we rolled out of the restaurant it was dark, but we managed to find the Hay caravan park a little ways outside the town center. The guys at the office were funny and helpful, one of them even walked us down to our site on the grass. We really felt warmly welcomed. Unfortunately it would not be the most restful night of sleep, as other campers had a dog that barked and barked incessantly for hours into the night. I almost cried with relief when it finally stopped.

Narrower and narrower

Thursday May 10 was a long drive westward on the Sturt, to Mildura, finally leaving New South Wales and crossing briefly into Victoria before entering South Australia. Just across the SA border we stopped in Renmark, which is a little bigger than most towns we had been through recently. The Visitor Information center there was much larger, located on a river. We looked at the maps and found a few possible camping places, but after talking to the lady in the center, we decided on Lyrup Flats, a part of the Murray River National Park. We drove back out of town and turned down a desolate looking gravel road that had a sign indicating the park. The road got narrower and rougher and I admit, I had major doubts. But then we came to a self-registration kiosk with a map, so for $7 we got a site for the night. We took a photo of the map and headed down the still-narrower washboard gravel road.

Finally we came to some numbered sites along a beautiful riverbank. The numbers did not follow what was listed on the map, and we drove around a bit more trying to find the promised pit toilets and a group of numbered sites near them. There were a few occupied sites, with fishing gear apparent. We ended up parking the car and walking round to find a level site, which was not easy! But we did find a lovely place to camp for the night, as well as a very nice, new pit toilet facility. As big as my doubts were, the place was even more beautiful. We had a lovely dinner of flavored tuna, cheese and crackers on the riverbank, at our new table.