Clare Valley to Yorke Peninsula

March 13 to March 20

While in Clare, on the way to Blyth for Sunday night (13^th), we dropped into the Knappstein Winery for a tasting. Not only do they have pretty darn good wines, but they brew two beers onsite. The beers were only fair (they’re all good, just some are better than others, hey Steve Maney?).

From there we headed across to the western side of the Yorke, travelling through Snowtown and Bute to Wallaroo on the Spencer Gulf. A great jetty but the only fishing is swimmer crabs (I call that crabbing, they call it “fishing”?) and squid. Some whiting, Australian salmon and gar fish around, but you must use floats due to the massive sea grass beds.

Marion Bay, morning coffee then a headland walk

We overnighted in Moonta Monday night, an historic mining town, a very well planned historic walk around the town again reminded us of how old some of their mining settlements are. We headed to Port Hughes for the first of many “Walk the Yorke” walks. Walk the Yorke was finally completed last year, and incorporates many loop walks but also the ability to trek the entire peninsula, some 300+kms. We completed many sections of Walk the Yorke over the next week. Tuesday night we were in Warooka at the local oval, a really central spot on the Peninsula which we used for three nights over the week.

Stenhouse Bay, Inneston Gypsum Train

Wednesday was Marion Bay near the bottom end of the “boot” shaped peninsula. Although it was a chores day for washing etc. we managed to have a good look around Marion Bay. Thursday was dedicated to the Innes National Park on the tip of the peninsula, and as far as National Parks go, this stacks up with the best! I would put it above Freycinet in Tassie, a lot more accessible. There is the ruins of Inneston, the Gypsum mining settlement in the 1800’s, which was a great self-guided walk. The coastal walks were spectacular as was the West Cape Lighthouse area. 

West Cape, Innes NP

I often complain about paying to enter some national parks, not this one! After most of the day there, we headed north to check out Corny Point and a cool ship wreck skeleton on Ethel Beach (think Dickey Beach but 10x the size), before returning to Warooka for the night.

Friday was coastline on the “heel” of the peninsula, more great walks and fantastic weather. It is the dry season for them and it has also been quite warm, ideal for tourists.

Not the World Champ, only 40 seconds

Saturday was a bit of a highlight for me, not only do I delight is finding great overnight camps, I love to stumble on (or planning for) small town festivals/music events/sporting events. Saturday was the Curramulka Speedshear Competition. Shearers from around Australia and New Zealand (yep, two from NZ) compete to shear a prepared sheep (neck, rump and stomach already shawn) as fast as they can, without missing any fleece or cutting the sheep. The current Guinness Book of Records titleholder was there, and 23.5 seconds later the sheep was shawn (and looking ……. “sheepish”).

We overnighted in Ardrossan, a coastal town on the eastern side of the peninsula, one of the better sites of the trip, right in the town and a short walk to the beach.

Sunday was tough. Leah’s dad is still in hospital, we have been getting daily updates, and they keep finding more issues with his health. We knew Leah had to go back, but it may take a number of weeks to finalise Russell’s issues and then prepare for his rehabilitation. We decide to PAUSE (not abort) our trip and drive back to Caloundra, planning to be back Easter Weekend. We have commitments in Darwin late June so we will resume our trip, all things being equal, in the next month or so, going north through Queensland and over to the Northern Territory. Once we are on the road again we will let you all know.

Broken Hill Lookout ....... what?

Overnight in Nyngan, next to the Big Bogan

 As we are driving back through Broken Hill/Cobar/Nyngan, we still tried to visit a few places as we may not have reason to go this way again. I have added a couple of photos of this drive for fun, the Nyngan one is for my “bogan” mates at Literacy, I won’t name names.