Denise and Barry's Caravan Travels: May 5, 2019

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

Cohuna

We finished travelling the Art Silo Trail today and were a little disappointed with the last silo as it seemed a little insipid compared to all the previous ones, but was still impressed with the talent that it takes to create these artworks.

We are now travelling along the Murray River and was making our way to Echuca when we noticed a lovely RV site at Cohuna a small town approx 60 klms from Echuca. We need to go to Echuca as needing to stock up on the White Port from the St Annes Winery for our friends Maree and Brian and of course ourselves. The town of Cohuna welcomes the free campers as most will spend some money in the town. We made a visit to the butcher, IGA and the bakery, spending $'s in the town that otherwise we would have passed through not stopping.

The last Silo at Lascelles

Lake Lascelles Hopetoun

Leaving Lake Lonsdale we made our way north along the Art Silo Trail from Rupanyup to Patchewollock. The trail stretches over 200 klms the paintings recognises and celebrates the region's people through a series of large scale mural portraits painted on grain silos.The artists were from Australia and overseas and the artwork tells a unique story about the each town.

Hopetoun provides a great area for free camping around Lake Lascelles which is walking distance from the township, in some areas there are powered sites that are $20 a night. We happened to strike it when the National Model Speed Boat Championships we being held there, like a lot of Bumble Bees in a bottle all day long! otherwise a lovey place to camp. We spoke with one competitor who told us it costs him $30 a race for fuel and glow plugs, a very expensive hobby. We stayed there for two nights and on the second night a dust storm past through with high winds followed by heavy rain. Wish I had thought to take a photo but was too intent on getting back to the van before we got saturated.

Lake Lascelles

Baz enjoying the sunshine Lake Lascelles

Wheat Silo Accommodation

Silos Rupanyup

Silos Sheep Hills

Silos Brim

Silos Rosebery

Silos Patchewollock

Art Silos Map

Monday, May 6, 2019

Lake Lonsdale/Halls Gap

Sunday we left the van at the lake and headed into Halls Gap a delightful small village situated at the foothills of the Grampians National Park. We couldn't believe all the cars, people and campers that were in at Halls Gap, we didn't know it was the annual Grape Festival one of the largest festivals in Victoria.

Leaving Halls Gap we made our way up the scenic route to Boroke Lookout, what a spectacular view well worth the drive up. We were very worried that we wouldn't see anything as we en counted heavy fog on the way. Our next top was Reid Lookout which was shrouded in fog, we were at least able to look at the info picture to know what we would have seen. It was then do we or don't we go onto Mackenzie Falls, as it was only about 7klms more we decided to have a look. Lucky for us there was good visibility and managed a couple of walks to the lookouts, baulking at the 265 steps to the base of the falls, knowing our poor old knees would't like them very much, maybe a lot.

Arriving back at the lake we decided to spend another night and Baz went gathering wood, so we could sit around our fire pot, it was only 14 degrees. Looking forward to when we get to warmer weather, we decided to spend a little time discovering new areas in Victoria that we haven't been to before.

Baz waiting to get warm at Lake Lonsdale

Boroka Lookout Grampians National Park

Reid Lookout would have been nice to
see the ranges

An inquisitive Emu in the carpark

On The Road Again - Tassie to The Big Island

After an eventful day on Wednesday with someone taking the side out of the Mazda and a funeral on Thursday we finally left Acton by lunchtime on Thursday 3rd May 2019

We made our way leisurely to Launceston, where we caught up with the Tassie Travellers Caravan Club, that were having their monthly muster at Old Macs Farm. What a lovely place to camp, only 10 minutes from the CBD of Launceston, lovely grassy sites and only $10 for the night. Before we left on Friday we walked up to their Cafe Stonesthrow where we enjoyed lovely scones jam and real cream, not that airy fairy fake stuff out of a can.

Friday afternoon we caught up with Dennis and Lyn in Ulverstone before heading over to Devonport to catch the boat. We arrived there at 5.30pm and were directed straight onto the Spirit, no lining up in the cattle grids. We had a relatively smooth sailing only felt a few bumps along the way.

Saturday was an early start with Baz rousing me at 5am, 15 minutes before the official wake up call. Lucky for us we had no one holding us up when disembarking there is always someone that will hold up the vehicles, either by not making note of what deck they left their vehicle and have trouble finding it, or by sleeping in. We got away nicely and had crossed over the Westgate Bridge by 6.10am and were making our way to Lake Lonsdale near Stawell, where we planned to spend the night.

After a coffee and toasted sandwich at Stawell we made our way out to the lake and set up camp. We sat outside for a while but found it was a bit chilly so headed inside for and afternoon siesta, had thought we may have gone to Halls Gap in the afternoon but upon waking decided to leave it to the next day.