Day 59: More Small Towns

On Day 58, we left Blanchetown (as you know) at about 11:00 am and reached the next small town, Swan Hill, in the afternoon. Swan Hill is famous for a hotel on a hill on the cliffs, but it was already getting cool when we reached there and we didn';t have time for much more than a quick drink in the historic hotel bar while we watched renters of Houseboat Unforgettable trying to dock. Their efforts were indeed unforgettable and I thought about yelling out additional instructions (which they would undoubtedly not have appreciated). From the hotel, the ferry was also visable. As mentioned, there are a lot of ferries in South Australia and fewer bridges. Waikerie, Morgan... and later Swan Reach, Walker Flat and Mannum all have ferries (Mannum with two that cross in the center even though the river isn't very wide). And all of these ferries have cables they stick up out of the water quite high, requiring us to wait until the ferry is on the other side before crossing.

On Day 59, we got an early start and reached Nildottie, the next small town, early. As mentioned in our map, it truly did have panoramic views. We bought meat pies in the grocers and ate lunch in the park, admiring the view of the red cliffs in the distance... cliffs we would later paddle past. The cliffs have all sorts of nooks, craneys and alcoves eroded into the softish rock and Dirk kept noting all the cockatoos huddled into the little holes, sometimes two to a tiny one.

After Nildottie, it got even better as we could also take our mid-afternoon break (and an ice cream!) at another table in another small town - Walker Flat. It was like Moorook in that it had a grassy bank by the river and a little store up from that. We camped shortly after that as the days are getting shorter and colder. We (I?) are finding is necessary to build a fire as quickly as possible on camping. We camped opposite a moored houseboat on land that was hard to find a spot flat enough to pitch tents. It was again Freehold property... not sure how it differs from private property, but in any case, it means "Keep Off".