But we did get what we needed from them, and that is a good thing.
We found a sneaky place to camp in the middle of the city suburbs for our last night there, instead of driving for an hour out of town. They had toilets and a river and everything. It was great. But it was even greater the next day when we left for the Barossa Valley and beyond.
We visited the Whispering Wall at the suggestion of some friends and, let me tell you, we are not immune to the novelty, that is for sure. We stood on either side, in the rain, talking to each other for AGES! It was cold and wet but too crazy not to keep playing with.
If you haven't been there, google it. It's this crazy wall. Built to hold up a massive damn full of water. But it just happens to be at the perfect acoustical angle to carry a whisper all the way along the 140m long wall! You stand at opposite ends and… well, whisper. It sounds like the other person is talking into a cheap microphone with a speaker hiding somewhere close. But, alas, no speaker. It's wild :)
After our little Barossa Visit we drove on up through the country, beeping at sheep and admiring the view.
H says,
"one day we'll be able to say that we've beeped at sheep in every state of the country!!!"
We found a hitchhiker along the way!
Now, when we were getting this van ready to go, we were determined to have spare seats for hitchers along the way. We didn't want to be that person who just drives past. So we kept the three back seats, instead of turning them into an actually comfortable bed, or some more storage. And this was the first time we got to use them.
Hitchhiker no. 1 was named Felix and was from France and wanted to go to a town called Melrose to go camping in the mountains. He carried only a backpack with him. Neither he, nor we, realised how far away Melrose was. Nearly 400km. And along a different route than I had planned [P.s. I'm the navigator] But we were so excited to give someone a lift that we took him straight there.
Then we stopped on the side of the road and camped there. Next to a huge unused paddock. Next to some old ruins. And we saw a beautiful Sunset and woke to a stunning Sunrise.
We enjoyed the sun for a while, then drove on, 'cause that's how we roll.
Now the aim was to go to the Flinders Ranges National Park, and go bushwalking for the day. I even packed a lunch for us. But… you know how I'm the navigator right…? Well, we ended up taking the wrong road and driving for 2 hours along it before realising that this was not the way… Sometimes these things just happen.
I was pretty sad because I really wanted to get up close and personal with the Flinders, I spent the drive reminiscing on my primary school project on Australian Explorers and everything! So, I spotted on the map a "main road" up ahead that was leading into the Ranges :) There are a few options. Main Highway,Main Road, Unsealed Road, 4WD only road. Well, this one looked pretty good.
It said the road was 30km's long so we turned onto it, and alas, it was unsealed. It was completely unsealed and bumpy as hell. Someone told us that when driving on a graded road in a 2wd it was best to just speed up and skip over the top of the bumps, so after going cautiously for a little while we decided to just try it.
Rev, rev rev and woah!
We were shaken like a paint tin at Bunnings.
H couldn't even hold the wheel anymore, the car was sliding out and everything on our dashboard was flying around the car. For a second, or maybe half a second, all of ours and the cars atoms seemed to separate and then come back together. It was incredible. And we're lucky the car didn't fall apart around us.
We turned around, and crept back to the Sealed Main Road, verbally encouraging map makers to be a little more specific about the state of their roads, and laughing the whole 2 hours back.
So here's what we saw of the Flinders Ranges.
Everything was shaken, except for Lego Man, who stood true and strong throughout our hardship.
We have decided to come back with a 4WD one day.
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