Baird Bay

We finally stopped last night at Cohen Rest Area, just north of  Cooper Hill, as it was going dark.  We had dinner, and went to bed.  We didn't see Tony and Val, but they may have gone out to Fowler's Bay or Cactus Beach.  I've heard both places are lovely, but we just have run out of time to visit.

This morning it was hard to get up because we have shifted forward 2.5 hours to South Australian time.  So to wake up at 7am SA time, we would be waking at 4.30am in WA.

Eventually we got on the road, and drove through Penong, a sheep producing area, where there were about 26 windmills outside of town. This was a real town, not just a roadhouse on the side of the highway, and we passed a school and houses.

Further down the road was Ceduna and the quarantine station where you have to hand over any fresh fruit and veg you might be bringing in from WA.  We had two dried up oranges from the bottom of my backpack to declare, but the rest we'd eaten.  I was a bit more prepared than I had been crossing into Western Australia up north.

Ceduna is the end of the Nullarbor crossing, civilization, traffic lights, and we stopped for reasonably priced fuel.  We made it!  Even along the longest stretch of straight highway in Australia between Balladonia and Caiguna (156km).  I forgot to add that a few days ago!

On we travelled, south on the Eyre peninsula, to Streaky Bay, a sleepy little seaside town, with naked hills rolling down to the deep blue water.  More grain fields and grazing land I think.  We stocked up at the IGA and found water for the van in a beach front park.

Grant hurried us on to our final stop, Baird Bay.  We turned around to check a dead Kangaroo for a baby joey, but upon closer inspection, the fly blown carcass looked a bit too disgusting for further prodding.  We kept on our dirt road trek.

West of Baird Bay is Point Labatt, the location a lot of sealions choose for a rest from their Southern Ocean fishing trips.  There is one narrow inlet to the ocean, and lots of green weed, which make the edges of the water look a bit slimy.  It's not a great swimming beach, and today it was very hot, and we'd arrived a bit grumpy, with the lack of sleep and the disturbed time zones.  We are now not sure whether we'll continue around the Eyre peninsular a bit further before Christmas or not.

There are two other couples camped here.  A young couple a month or two into their twelve month trip around Australia, and an older couple, Maxine and Leo, from Mt Gambier south of Adelaide, who have raised their five children and are taking their time travelling around.  Maxine took us over the road to the beach when she threw out the rubbish from their fishing trip this morning.  Fish heads, spines, tails.  Joseph walked up the beach and brought back a crowd of Pelicans to feed.  Maxine said yesterday they all just flew at her when she came over.

We were also visited this evening by a lovely old fellow, a Vietnam Vet., who sat and chatted and told us how to cater a Greek Wedding for 400 people among other things.  He gave us a few kg of fish fillets, some avocados, some oranges and some plums.  Now Dominic wants to hang around till Christmas to chat with him some more.  It might also have something to do with the fact that he's offered to take us out in his boat tomorrow if we're still here.

This afternoon we drove up the beach a way and over a sand dune, to the other side of the cliffs.  We played in the water at a seaweed littered beach, that was covered in white gravel rather than sand.  It was the easiest stuff to brush off.  Sand sticks to everything, but this stuff was great!  The waves were quite big, however, and I managed to get dumped while sitting in about 20cm of water!  The boys thought it looked hilarious.

Nadine was funny.  It was a huge effort to get her to change into her togs, come into the car, then get out at the beach.  She was adamant that she wouldn't be swimming, it only made her sticky, and she was never, ever going to get in the water.  Well, we got her onto the beach, she wandered around for a bit, then when we all got splashing in the water, she came and joined us and was jumping and laughing with the rest of us.  Later, in the caravan, she said it was the first time she'd swum in sea water and not felt sticky afterwards! Isn’t that amazing!

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Vicki