DAY 164 – PORT GERMEIN AND THEN WE’RE OFF TO EXPLORE ADELAIDE……
We didn’t manage to leave quite as early
as we planned this morning, however we did get away before 9am.
Today would be the longest drive we have
undertaken since coming off the Nullabor almost three weeks ago and even then
we only have a little over 300kms to go…
We weren’t in a rush and thought we
would stop off at a couple of places along the way…
Our first stop was Port Germain, to see what was
once the longest wooden jetty in the Southern Hemisphere. At 1532 meters long
it is only surpassed these days by Bussleton Jetty in Western Australia ( 1900
meters long) .
The jetty itself was first built
in 1881 to replace the method of transporting grain grown in the area by horse
and cart over the sand flats at low tide which was then put on platforms to
await for the high tide before flat bottom barges could collect the wheat,
taking it then to the awaiting ships. An extension added to the jetty in 1883
bringing the total length to 1676 metres or 5,500ft. Storms have damaged the jetty over a number of years ,
the last being in 2016 and the length of the jetty has been reduced to about
1500 metres.
The jetty’s lighthouse , which use
to be located at the end of the jetty is now positioned at the start of the
jetty as is the rare maritime Clock Faced Tide Gauge. The illuminated gauge was
located in the shipping channel to inform ships when it was safe to navigate
through. There is believed to be only one other like this and that is in
Tasmania.
Port Germain is an old historic town and
worth the visit. In hindsight, we
probably should have stayed an extra night so that we could benefit from
immersing ourselves in all the history about this old historic town.
We probably spent a good hour wandering
around the jetty precinct, reading all
about Port Germain and walking the start of the jetty.
About half an hour after leaving Port Germein we came across Harry's Homemade Foods and they were advertising fresh prawns for $19.. Thought we would stock up on a few for Christmas. WOW what a surprise package this place turned out to be.. We did a little damage with the credit card here as not only did we get prawns but South Australain honey, prawns, and some pickled scallops and crab meat. It must be pretty good, because the place was teaming with people, and we met one couple from the other side of Adelaide who spent a fortune here. They stock up every time they come through.
We had talked about visiting Port Pirie
but after spending so much time at Port Germain, decided to leave it for
another visit to the area….
We had planned to stop in Port Wakefield
for lunch as it was only another hour after that until we would arrived in
Adelaide.
We arrived in Port Wakefield around
lunch time and drove through town looking for a nice picnic area down by the
water…. What a disappointment.. Port Wakefield is not on the water, just a heap
of mangroves with no shaded picnic area…. So we left the car running and ended
up have a bit to eat in the car as it was close to 40 degrees today.
Back on the road again with just under
100kms to go until Adelaide. We arrived
around 2pm and booked into our caravan park.
I think we have been blessed once again as we literally only 10 minutes
from the city and with our Top Tourist Discount, managed to book in at the
lovely Windsor Gardens Caravan Park for $31.50 a night. All the other parks we tried were over $40
with some going up over $50 by the weekend due to the peak season starting.
The plan for when we got here was to fix
the plug on the front of the van, and get the washing done… It was a scorcher
here… so hot that even setting up had us in a lather of sweat. We spent most of the afternoon in doors with
the airconditioning on, not even getting the washing finished until 5pm because
it was just way to hot to be outside.
Once the washing was done we decided to
head for the coast in the hope that it would be much cooler there.
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| They seem to be dumping truck loads of sand back onto the beaches |
Meandering down along the coast we came
across this Mega activity centre. It
looked awesome and something our kid would really enjoy doing. They also had a Mini Golf Put Put set up that
also looked pretty cool. Of course we
had to take photos…
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| Massive sea grass cliffs on the beach.. |
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| Sunset really is a staircase to Heaven |
We wandered down to the headlands of the
beach also for a look. It seems they are
doing a lot of beach restoration work down this way at the moment, as the bay
is being dredged and they are dumping truck loads of sand on the beach
again.
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| On the beach at Henley at sunset |
We continued to drive along the coast
until we came to Henley. This place was
crowded, there were people everywhere,
it was a real hive of activity,
the beach was full of people, they were still in the water at 8.30pm at
sunset. We decided that since it was
nearly sunset we would watch the sunset over the ocean. It was beautiful, another magical sunset…. another magical moment together…
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| Sunset over Henley Beach - Adelaide |
We couldn’t believe how many people were
down here for a midweek night. At least
it was a lot cooler out on the coast here than it had been back at the caravan
park.
It was time for us to head home as I
still had washing on the line that needed to be collected and we still needed
to have dinner….
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| Christmas Lights we saw on our way home... |
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| Heading home in the evening |
It has been a good day, even if it has
been unbearably hot. Hopeful some cool
weather will come soon. A week ago I was
complaining about the cold, it seems that weather at the bottom of Australia is
anything but predictable…
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