Mount Gambier

Before we left Nelson, Lidia tried her hand at taming some wild creatures. First hand feeding magpies with Spam, then feeding strawberries to kangaroos. Successful with the magpies, but the roo would not come quiet close enough

 

Lidia and baby Kangaroo

Lidia and Magpies

The boarder crossing had come up quicker than expected, and we are not allowed to take fruit and vegies across the line. So, last night's dinner was all but vegetarian, and breakfast was fruit only. I don't think we will eat pears or apples for a while now.

Boarder crossing breakfast for 2

The car was hardly even warmed up in the few kms it took to reach the SA boarder, but at least this time they had plenty of shoulder room to the side of the road to cater for tourist photos, which I believe we nailed. We also snuck a cheeky VIC boarder photo facing the other direction. I know it's not the official one, but we have it anyway.

From here we visited Ewens ponds. They are fresh water ponds where the water comes from natural underground spring water, filtered by limestone. They are crystal clear. While we were there it was raining, so the photos didn't show the clarity, but it was truly amazing. If the day was a bit warmer, I would have jumped in - but, a 16 degree raining day, and colder water talked me out of it.

We then headed for the southern Rock Lobster capital of Australia, Port MacDonnall. When we got there, the fresh seafood shop had a big fat "closed" sign in the door. We went to the information centre, and they said that the fisherman bring all the fresh seafood in very early morning, then they sell it. When it's all sold out, he closes the shop until the next day. Short story, no lobster for Graham and Lidia :(
We expected more from Port MacDonnall, but it is basically just a fishing village, and getting out of the fishing season, things were very quiet.




 


Next stop was Mount Schank, and quiet volcano. They don't believe it's extinct, but the last eruption was 2500 years ago. The camera lens couldn't get the whole crater in, so the photos only show the part, but it is basically a crater.









We took a unmaintained, and probably the worst designated working trail I have ever been on to the inside of the volcano.  It turns out, the inside surface of the volcano is the same as the outside surface, just a lot more walking and climbing.







Someone had made a love heart in the centre, and I wanted to make other shapes using the rocks, but Lidia thought it not appropriate.

So, no funny shapes, I thought I would try something romantic, and craped out initials into the ground and filled it with water to make it stand out for at least a few hours - then got in trouble for wasting our drinking water.



With the walking done for the day, we headed for Mount Gambier. We found a caravan park, and dropped off the old van before heading out to do some site seeing. The Blue Lake was incredible. Standing there looking at it, it looks fake, but I promise, I didn't use any filters of photoshop on the photo, that just how it looks.

The lake changes colour during the year, and right now is in its blue phase. They are not sure why it changes colour, but have some theories relating to temperature changes and microbiology stuff. The lake is on average 70 meters deep and provides all of the town water.

Next we visited some sinkholes, which are pretty cool, but the stand out things to me is that one of them is in the city, and they have built around it. I'm assuming that someone knows their stuff, and the shop next door isn't going to fall in and become another sinkhole.