How it all began
After a night at Grace Emily (a pub down the road from our hostel) and just a couple of hours of sleep we got up early to pack our things and waited outside to be picked up at 7am. Still pretty tired it took a while to get used to sitting in a bus, being driven around rather than driving myself. A nice change though! The group was very mixed and obviously we didn’t know any of the others yet. Some seats were empty but in Coober Pedy four more would join us. But that’s another story.
While Suzan was organising the musical background (well done by the way!) Kev told us from time to time about the regions we were driving through or the places we could see to our left and right. It started all pretty green, hills and trees and didn’t look very different to Victorian landscapes at that stage. But we weren’t really far away from Adelaide yet anyway. Leaving the clouds of the city and the sea behind us we were heading into the Flinders Ranges along the B82, blue sky awaiting us at the horizon.
We stopped a few times on the way in little country town like Clare and Laura (which is famous for its ice cream) where we learned more little details like the reason for the very wide roads in those towns (thanks already to Kev for being a really good guide!). We also passed the oldest town in the Flinders Ranges, Melrose.
While it was getting sunnier and warmer Claudia was fighting hard in her sleep, trying to keep her head upright. Pretty funny to watch but when she woke up next we actually swapped seats so she could sleep leaning onto the window. I wasn’t really tired but really exciting, trying to soak up every little bit of impressions along the way.
Kevin was flying low rather than driving and a s a result we lost a couple of swags off the trailer. For those who don’t know Swags (from the Aussie term Swagman), those neat inventions are basically a very sturdy bag of canvas with an integrated foam mat inside and a zip to open. You can but your sleeping bag inside and ready is your weather and dingo proof bed!
To the tunes of the Australian legend INXS we crossed the historically important Goyder Line which was drawn in 19th century by surveyor general George Goyder marking the 250 millimetre rainfall area from the Eyre Peninsula around to the Riverland. According to his report, based on one year of researching the weather conditions of the region, only south of the line farming would be worthwhile. So those patches of land were sold for a much higher price than everything north of the line. Some settlers tried to prove him wrong and farmed the cheap land north of the line – numerous ruins of those farms witness that Goyder was actually right.
In Quorn we toasted sandwiches on a barbie for lunch and had a rest in the park. Quorn used to be a big railway town (the old Ghan stopped there) with 20 massive pubs (normally towns would have rather two or three).
From now on we were following the old Ghan line into the Flinders Ranges. The soil was slowly turning red, bushes and trees became much sparser and the mountains of the Flinders Ranges were already clearly visible. At an Aboriginal art site, the Yourambulla caves at Kangaroo Mountain where Kev explained to us some of the habits and traditions of Aboriginal people in Australia. After another short stop for a quick toilet run (some really ran!) in Hawker we turned off the Highway onto a gravel road, not far away from our destination for today, Parachilna Gorge.
Pretty much everybody must have woken up from their dreams when suddenly Suzan cranked up the volume, AC/DC at their best, and Kev pushed the pedal all the way through the floor. Bang, a first pothole, only to be followed by sounds that convinced me that we would need more than this one Bus (called Dizzy as far as I remember, what a perfect name in that case) to get through seven days of Kev driving. The second bang sounded like all wheels came off at the same time, but we were still driving so I guess not yet … shooting over a hill I’m sure we were airborne for a while and the loud Whoooaaaah from behind only increased Kev’s effort to destroy the coach! But he was clearly enjoying himself a lot (so was I, would have liked to drive myself, though) and eventually we actually made it to the campsite, an old tuberculosis station where we had a great BBQ for dinner and sat around the fire before Suzan, David, Kev, Claudia and I slipped into our swags to enjoy a night in the Outback under the stars (and what stars I can tell you, amazing! Although the bright full moon spoiled the view a bit).
