The beautiful beaches at Cape Le Grand were enough to entice Barbie away from her bingeing and man chasing to give the surf a go. The water was cold but the conditions were perfect and there wasn't another surfer in the water for 50km.
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Barbie was also very happy to be in Broome and finally to be at the beach. I’m not sure how much actual swimming she did though. She never came down to the beach with us. Turns out she found the nudie end of Cable Beach and decided that it was more to her liking. Despite our rocky start, Darwin and I are getting on just fine. I’ve really come to like the place a lot. It’s very layback and the dry season climate is about my ideal. It’s hot, but not too humid (although today it is a bit sticky), and the balmy nights are fantastic. Add to that the Darwin Festival vibe and it’s a great place to be at the moment. We’ve been to a couple of restaurants (with contrasting results – see previous blog), done the Mindil Beach markets, Parap markets, found a favourite cafe for coffee and breakfast and Jen has tracked down an icecream shop with her icecream and chocolate sensitive nose (Lamington flavour is the go apparently). The music and food at the Mindil markets was outstanding. I found a didge and drum duo (Rawdidge) that had me spellbound. I would have happily spent the entire evening just listening to them. I had intended bringing my didge with me hoping that 5 months of practise would really improve my playing ability, but along with a number of other items, it’s at home in the forgotten items pile. Having seen these guys play, I’m really missing it now. We also saw a superb English backpacker duo at the Parap markets this morning who set themselves up busking amongst the crowd. Very entertaining French and Spanish songs that drew quite a crowd and filled their collection hat almost to capacity. They won’t have any problems feeding themselves for the next few days and judging by the crowd demographics, I’m pretty sure they won’t be lonely or cold for the next few nights either. From our base here in Darwin, we took the camping gear (yes, back to real camping in a tent with sleeping bags!) down to Litchfield National Park. Yet another absolutely magnificent part of the world. We drove out to the Litchfield Park Cafe where we had hamburgers that were up there with the best I’ve ever had. From the cafe we then made our way back towards the town of Bachelor at the start of the National Park stopping at a few of the destinations along the way. We swam at Wangi Falls, went on to Tolmer Falls lookout, tested my recently acquired 4WD driving skills into the Lost City along a real 4WD track (complete with sandy sections and drop offs, a really fun drive), then onto our favourite swimming spot of this trip, Buley Rockpools and then onto our overnight campsite and the best of the falls, Florence Falls. Florence Falls had 2WD and 4WD drive in campgrounds, both of which were filling up quickly, so we claimed a spot at the closer 2WD campground. We then went out to check what the 4WD campsites were like and this was another real 4WD track that again was a lot of fun to drive and which also tested the new skills. I still haven’t quite got the nerve to try one of the over the wheel hubs creek crossings yet, but maybe one day. The van park where we’re staying is really lovely with just the right character and feel. You might think that being just two to three kilometres away from the Darwin airport runways and the RAAF base would be a problem but like any other airport, Darwin airport has a curfew too. The commercial flights are only allowed to take off and land over the caravan park between the hours of 4am to 8am and 10pm and 1am and the RAAF has even tighter controls on the noisiest of its aircraft. Hercules and helicopter gunships are restricted to a very small window: 2am to 3am. So, as you can see noise is only a problem for the briefest of moments each day. Tonight we're off to see Clare Bowditch, who's here for the Darwin Festival - we managed to buy the last two tickets on our first night here. Tomorrow will be our last day in Darwin and then it’s off to Kakadu. I’ll be sorry to leave this city but am looking forward to Kakadu. Raw Didge - I enjoyed these guys so much, I took one of there CDs and a hefty dose of inspiration away with me. After four fabulous days at Uluru, a disasterous start to the morning of our departure brought home to us just how much we'd been neglecting poor Barbie. She's been ignoring us and for the most part we've been ignoring her. I did point out to her on the day that we arrived at the Yulara camping ground that we were in the middle of the desert and that there was plenty of trouble out there for the unwary. She chose to ignore my warnings and often wandered off into the scrub by herself without telling anyone where she was going. Just before we were ready to leave , I went up onto the dune behind our van to look at Uluru one last time. It was lucky that I did. Once again, I saved Barbie. Had I not taken that walk, we may have been subject to long court cases, media scrutiny and entered into Australian folklore. Oh no!! A dingo's got my Barbie! Time for another update. We've spent a very relaxing week in the McLaren Vale and Adelaide district sampling great wine, beer and food. This is a lifestyle I've now become very accustomed to and only have four and bit months left to get unused to it or to find a sponsor or employer willing to fund this new lifestyle of mine on a longer term basis. I'm sure there's a benefit to humanity somewhere in all this and its up to some committed entrepreneur to find it. Apart from sampling wine and beer at various wineries and breweries, I managed to get a few rides in around the very picturesque rolling hills and vineyards around McLaren Vale. The area reminded me very much of parts of Italy we toured through two years ago. I rode up Wilunga Hill twice and part of this year's route for stage 5 of the Tour Down Under down to Aldinga Beach and along the esplanade. Also rode the 45km into Adelaide itself. This week was the last hit out on the road bike before its put away until our return to Canberra in December and I couldn't have been in a better place for training. My top tips for recovery after training rides in this region: Coffee, muffins and friands - Market 190 Cafe Pizza, Vale Ale and various red wines - Oscars Cheese and red wine - purchased anywhere in McLaren Vale, consumed in the campervan Beer, Pinot Grigio, Chardonnay, Antipasto, pasta - Vasarelli Cellar Door And so, after a week it was back to Canberra to pick up our X-Trail from the smash repairers ready to start the next stage of the trip. After a week and a half of living in the campervan, the new camper trailer is going to feel like a mansion. We came home via Griffith NSW which is where my family moved to from Brisbane for 18 months when I was 5 years old. I started school in Griffith and was keen to see whether there was anything in the town that I would recognise after 43 years absence. There was and the overnight stay left me feeling quite nostalgic and realising Griffith's importance in my early development. Starting school here, this is where I received my first real training in how to stand out from the crowd - seeking attention through misbehaviour has stood me in good stead to this very day! Barbie visits the Dog on the Tucker Box Wilunga Hill climb. Wilunga Hill descent
Against my better judgement, we took Barbie with us yesterday when we toured the wineries. This was Barbie's first outing to the classier purveyors of alcohol and my initial fears turned out to be well founded. As soon as she asked for ice with her "freebies", I knew we were in trouble. We were forced to leave one establishment in a hurry when Jen caught her drinking straight from the spitoons. It was not such a good day! The wine tasting started off OK, with Barbie participating respectfully initially. She even bought a half dozen of some very nice Cab Sauv/Shiraz/Merlot blends from Scarpantoni to share. We were impressed. But from the beer and pizza lunch on, she just grew more and more embarrassing. She just did not know when to stop! There's at least one winery in McLaren Vale that we are not welcome to visit again. This episode has put a bit of a black mark on this leg of our journey. Thanks very much Barbie. You've made a fool of yourself and I hate to think what would have become of you if we weren't there to rescue you. Needless to say, you're grounded and you will be staying in your side pocket of my bag to think about what you've done until you are ready to come out and sincerely apologize. With WiFi now available here in McLaren Vale and no digital dog to eat my digital homework I guess I’ve run out of excuses not to update my blog. So, here goes... Week one of our trip has taken us from Canberra to McLaren Vale with overnight stops at Hay, Lake Mungo National Park and Murray Bridge. We’re travelling in the Hiace campervan and not the X-Trail and campertrailer, thanks to some gale force winds, which is a good thing. The enforced closeness in the Hiace is an enriching experience, isn’t it Jen? There haven’t been any “camping holiday” moments at all. We got off to a flying start and being very conscious of the dangers of driver fatigue our first Stop, Revive, Survive coffee break was Yass. We eventually made it to Hay for the first night where much to Barbie’s disappointment we had no TV reception and therefore no Tour De France coverage (I wasn’t impressed by her sour mood that night – the Tour De France is not the be all and end all Barbie!). Night two and the next day saw us at Lake Mungo National Park. The drive in and out was spectacular. It might look like flat, desolate, salt bush country and nothing more from the car, but the plant and birdlife when we stopped and looked around was beautiful. There was no TripleJ reception on the radio but we didn’t need it. Aural entertainment for the 200km of dirt roads we travelled was provided by the sounds of the crockery and cutlery in the back of the van crashing and breaking. Lake Mungo was the venue for two field trips for me 30 years ago. The first was a Year 12 Archaeology field trip, the second a Uni Geomorphology field trip. Both trips live very large in my memory and both were quite instrumental in germinating the seed that became who I am today. Both trips also introduced me to the experience of drinking alcohol without adult supervision (yes, I was a very late starter) – when I say without adult supervision, I don’t mean to imply that adults weren’t present, because they were. Perhaps they were supervising and the teaching technique they employed was to allow us, blossoming adults that we were, to discover the unpleasantness of alcoholic poisoning for ourselves. Thanks to trip two, to this day I cannot even smell ouzo without my stomach somersaulting several times. Anyway, Mungo was fabulous. Seeing the woolshed, shearers quarters and the Walls of China where we were involved in an archaeological dig brought back so many wonderful memories. Murray Bridge was night three where we stayed in the same caravan park that I stayed in back in January when I came over to Adelaide for the Tour Down Under. The lady running the park remembered me from January but thought I was in the office as the husband of the 70 something women registering in front of me. One of us walked out of the office that evening with a spring in our step and feeling quite flattered and one of us didn’t! And now we’re in a beautiful caravan park in McLaren Vale surrounded by vineyards. We’ll base ourselves here for the next 4 or 5 days and sample the various wineries and cafes in the district. There’s also a number of bike rides we can do from here, one of which Jenny has just set out on that will take her down to the beaches. I’m about to do part of the Tour Down Under Stage 5 route and climb Wilunga Hill again to work off some of the pies, pastries, red wine and local beers I’ve been indulging in over the last few days. Not sure that my level of fitness has been sustained since we left Canberra really, so this could be interesting. Barbie left frosty Canberra this morning and headed for Lake Mungo, the Murray Valley and Adelaide. Before departing, she tried on her helmet mount for the GoPro camera and filmed a short mountain bike ride. See you at Lake Mungo.
Pre tour preparation: Barbie agrees to test the waterproof HD video camera with a quick trip and some surfing time at the Pipe, Hawaii.
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Greg ShawGreg Shaw - spouse of Jenny, layabout, documentary film maker (most noted for working exclusively with his star subject, Barbie) Archives
November 2011
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