For the start of the school holidays we had a quick get away to the Gawler Ranges in south central South Australia, about an 8 hour drive west of Adelaide:
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| Gawler Ranges |
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| Driving from Adelaide (7 hrs 15 - 650km) |
The Gawler Ranges is a National Park formed by volcanic activity 1.5 billion years ago, in this case a volcanic lake was created rather than a series of volcanos. This resulted in many small, rocky hills, rhyloite (red volcanic stone) formations and scrubby plains. The area was named after the Governor of South Australia in 1839 (George Gawler) and was originally a series of sheep stations. These stations eventually formed into a larger station and then were handed back to the native owners (the Barngarla, Kokatha and Wirangu people) under the Gawler Ranges Native Title Claim.
Kristine's parents were working in the national park and invited us up to stay for a few days at the Paney Shearer's Quarters. Since we had a few free days and a need to get away for a while, we decided to head up from Sunday 5th July and return Wednesday 8th July.
We set out on the Sunday morning around 9am, with our first stop being Port Wakefield (132km / 1hr45) to the north. The brought us to the top of the Fleurieu Peninsula and the start of the Yorke Peninsula.
We had a quick stretch and toilet break at Port Wakefield, before heading to Port Augusta at the eastern edge of the Eyre Peninsula (209km / 2hrs from port Wakefield). We stopped there for lunch and then pushed onwards to Kimba.
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| The drive |
At Kimba (158km / 1hr45min from Port Augusta) we had a quick stop and let Kristine's parents know that we were on the way. They would meet us at our next stop and lead us into the park.
Kimba is famous for being halfway across Australia east to west (coast to coast as the crow flies) :
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| Halfway Across Australia |
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| Kimba |
As the sign above says, Kimba was first settled in 1908 as a farming area. It was proclaimed a town in 1915, shortly after it was connected to the main rail line from Port Lincoln. It is also home to another of Australia's "Big" icons - the Big Galah. The Galah was built in 1993 and is 8m tall:
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| The Big Galah |
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| Big Galah |
There was also some silo art (painting on wheat silos), but we missed it this time and caught it on the way back.
Our next stop was Wudinna (pronounced Wood-Na) - (103km / 1hr from Kimba). We met Kristine's parents, Peter and Heather, here and split up. Kristine, Alana and Heather took our car and took the easier dirt roads into the Gawler Ranges, while Peter took me and the boys through the offroad sand dune track - much more exciting. The trip in was about an hour (57km), and we arrived at the Paney Shearer's Quarters about the same time as the girls - about 5:30pm.
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| The kids watching a movie on Alana's laptop |
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| Iron Knob - between Port Augusta and Kimba |
Our accomodation for the trip was the be the Paney Shearer's Quarters, a series of sheds and buildings that originally served as accomodation for the shearer's working on the station. There were 13 separate bunk rooms, 3 Honeymoon Suites (for couples), a recreation room, dining room and kitchen and 3 bathrooms:
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| Layout of the Shearer's Quarters |
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| Alana and Kristine in the kitchen |
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| We had an awesome moonrise over the Ranges |
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| The Recreation Room (with stone chimney) and bunk rooms behind |
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| Unloading the car |
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| Panoramic shot from the front of the Quarter's looking towards the Shearer's Sheds |
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| Shearer's Sheds |
The full moon rose pretty early over the flat ground to the east, making it a bit too bright for Kristine to take night sky photos, but giving us some nice moon-rise photos. The only downside to the day was that Peter's car managed to get a large stick through the radiator on the drive in and was going to need to be towed to Wudinna for a replacement radiator.
Kris and I set up in the bunk room attached to the dining quarters and set the kids up in the Rec Room as it had a heater. It got down to around zero degrees overnight, but Kris had packed a heater for us also, so it was a comfortable night.
We woke pretty early on the Monday (6th July) and caught an amazing sunrise (that was unfortunately hard to capture on film). Then a thick fog rolled in. It burned off pretty quickly but looked impressive
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| Sunrise |
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| Fog rolling in |
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| The fog |
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| Peter's car heads off to Wudinna |
While the kids and I had breakfast, Kristine took a trip out to pick up some supplies with her parents and snapped our first pictures of the Ranges:
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| It started a little foggy... |
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| As the fog lifted she caught some shots of the kangaroos |
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| Kangaroos crossing the road |
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| Kangaroos |
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| Emu |
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| One of the rocky hills |
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| Looking out over the Ranges |
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| Wedge-Tail Eagle |
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| Wedge-Tail Eagle |
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| Wedge-Tail Eagle |
When Kristine got back, we decided to start our exploration - beginning in the Shearing Sheds just across the road from the Shearer's Quarters:
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| Exit chutes - where the sheep are sent once shorn |
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| Corrals for sheep ready to enter the sheds |
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| Inside the Shearer's Shed |
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| The Shearing mechanisms and chutes |
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| Mechanism for running the shears |
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| A demonstration wool press |
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| Heading back to the Shearer's Quarters |
We then headed back to the Shearer's Quarters, picked up our bags with some water and a picnic lunch and went for a hike up the hills behind the quarters.
It was a nice walk, with some great views. We stopped for our picnic at the top and then followed the trail back down:
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| Start of the hike |
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| Going up |
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| A quick rest to check out the view |
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| Panoramic looking back east at the Shearer's Quarters |
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| Shearer's Quarters - Half way up |
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| Going up again - red rocks and spinifex |
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| ...and up... |
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| The view west from the top |
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| View south |
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| Shearer's Quarters |
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| View west |
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| Bird at the top of the hill |
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| Rock structures |
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| Shearer's Quarters and Shearer's Shed |
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| Wildflowers |
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| Heading back down |
When we got back down, Peter and Heather took us for a tour of the park in their four wheel drives. We started by driving to one of the man-made dams. These were being filled in, as the artificial water sources were increasing the kangaroo population to numbers that could not be sustained by the food supply. In the summer, a large number of kangaroos had died, so the park had culled some of their number and filled in the artificial dams to try to reduce the numbers to a sustainable level.
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| Our convoy |
Our next stop was Kolay Hut, where Peter and Heather had been doing some restoration work, and we checked out the 'Donkey' an old style fire water heater:
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| The 'Donkey' at Kolay Hut |
Our next stop was the Kolay Mirica Falls - dry but still impressive. The falls were made from volcanic rhyolite, in a similar way to the Icelandic volcanic pillars. It is predicted that they formed around 1.5 billion years ago, when ash and lava formed thick pillars, known here as 'organ pipes':
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| The Kolay Mirica Falls from the carpark |
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| Heading up |
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| Rhyolite formations |
Our next stop was a little off-road place that Peter called 'Wombat City'. It was a series of wombat dens and we got to see several wombats in the area, as well as to see how fast they can run when they want to:
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| Wombat burrows |
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| Burrow |
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| Wombat |
By the time we finished up at Wombat City it was starting to get dark, so we headed back to the Shearer's Quarters for a dinner of spaghetti bolognese and roasted marshmallows on a campfire.
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