Well I have driven a long way round South Australia and into Victoria now. There are long straight roads with very little traffic for the most part. (Although last night’s and tonight’s hotels are on main roads….). There seem to be more lorries and road trains in Victoria than SA. The roads are also worse.

Alongside the roads there are a combination of native bush – often National Park or similar, farmlands with cows, horses or, further south, sheep and acres and acres of pine trees. The towns are small and far apart and often the farms are just a track with a nameplate of some kind. I had difficulty finding a cafe and a toilet at lunch time – I seemed to find a town without either and had to ask at the tourist information. These are two old bungalows – one from the 1840s and a ‘gentleman’s’ one from the 1870s.

As it is Christmas, a lot of the farmers have some sort of Father Christmas near their gates – made of hay bales, painted on hay bales, riding tractors, driving home made reindeer, driving an old pickup truck etc. Cheerfully, although the costumes appear to be bought, most of the actual figures are home made. And very creepy some of them are, too. The most minimal was a pair of real antlers, attached to an old red barrel shaped mailbox.

I haven’t seen a lot of livestock on the road although I have seen roadkill – kangaroos and possums mainly. There was the emu (and the snake) yesterday and some kangaroos when I was with Anne and Andy. Apparently kangaroos will run forward rather than back when they are on the side of the road so you need to be aware. Anne also warned me not to drive at dusk or at night if I could help it as that is when they are most active.

Today

Driving from Penola to Port Fairy. This was apparently named after a whaling boat called the Fairy which was the first European ship to come into the harbour. Interestingly, there is a plaque in memory of the Aboriginal people massacred between 1837 and 1844. Next to it there is another plaque in memory of one of Australia’s first property developers who laid out the town – in 1843. Do we think these things are related?

Anyway, firstly I drove to Mount Gambier, a town built on a series of old volcanoes (there is a theme to this holiday) and went to the blue lake. Apparently it’s grey in the winter.

There’s also a green one.

After that I went to a place called Nelson – the one with no visible town centre – and ended up on another beach in a national park. Nice beach at the end of a river with signs saying don’t swim in the sea because of the currents and don’t swim in the river because of weed and mud.

After that, down here to stay in a little cottage in someone’s garden. Greeted at the gate by two chickens who had to have the door slammed in their faces as they were keen to join me.