Road Dogs U.S.: Winding down in the Barossa Valley

Entries from Jean – In White My comments in Italics:
After a good night’s sleep, a shower and a good continental breakfast, we were back on the road heading towards the Barossa Valley where we’d decided to spend our last few days. The landscape was now much flatter and the temperature was cooler, 20 degrees at 9.15 a.m. which felt decidedly cold. When we stopped for petrol, John wondered about replacing his fly net which he thought he’d lost (he later found it in the car). One of the locals in the garage asked if we were heading up i.e. towards Alice springs or down towards Adelaide. We told him we had been to ‘the Rock’ and were heading back. He said the flies weren’t so bad this year compared to other years. Is he joking?? They were horrendous but no – apparently this is a ‘light fly year’ God help those who visit in a heavy fly year!

Had a roadside stop at a place called Bon Bon. This was just a roadside rest area thoughtfully provided with chemical “dunnies” – the sign on the toilet lid said “If you haven’t eaten it, don’t drop it down the tube” Oh gross!! I won’t give you all the details but suffice to say that if we hadn’t been desperate, we wouldn’t have used it. The next toilet stop was Glendambo again – “Welcome to Glendambo. Elevation 150m. Population – Sheep 22,500, Flies 2,000,000, Humans 30” . Took a photo of Freddy behind the bar who remembered us but I don’t suppose they see that many people out there. Then stopped for lunch at a disgusting café where the bacon sandwiches tasted of fish. (That brought back memories of my childhood for some reason) Still 650 kms to go.

At our last roadside stop, we found the birds sitting on the picnic tables with their mouths open—they were SO hot and dry. Gordon and I found a few plastic buckets and filled them with water. Within seconds, they were covered with birds, dying for a drink. Even the trees in the Outback are unique. While most trees grow tall to reach sunlight, these trees space themselves out for water. It was hard to imagine a more inhospitable landscape.

There is a weed at the side of the road whose fruit looks like yellow tennis balls but has the texture of apples. This is not indigenous to Australia but is believed to have been carried there as seeds on the feet of camels as they are the only animal who will eat them. Apparently they taste disgusting.

To pass the time, we thought up good names for sports teams:
v The Glendambo Go-anners (a go-anner is a type of Aussie lizard)
v The Woomera Wool-bailers
v The Coober Noodlers
v The Alice Springers

This was a long tedious journey with little to look at in the desert.

As we got further south however, we passed lots of salt lakes which looked like water and were very picturesque. Eventually, we came back to Port Augusta so stopped at the Information Centre, bought more water and choc ices and managed to get booked in a cottage for three nights. It was called ‘Treasured Memories Cottage’ and was in a place in the Barossa Valley (where they make the wine) in a town called Tununda. Each couple was paying $100 per night including breakfast which would be left for us. This place was about three hours from Port Augusta and at 4 pm when we were there, the temperature was 28 degrees – lovely.

We found Tununda and stopped almost straight away at a Thai/Indian/Australian restaurant in a converted railway carriage. After a nice meal, we found the cottage which was lovely – detached and all stripped pine, lace and little extras like chocolates, port, pot pourri and personal photos. The theme of the place was the Titanic and there were lots of pictures and other references to it around the place. Gordon and I were on the top floor in a bed with a lace canopy, John & Debs were in another room downstairs with a four-poster bed. We had a spa bath and a shower and it was all very luxurious. That night we sat about drinking wine till late.

Next day, Monday the 21st, we all awoke late with hangovers so the day was spent lazily mooching around Tununda and sunbathing (the first chance we’d had – too cold in Adelaide and too hot up country ). Tanunda was a lovely tourist town, mostly built along one long street with a few small shops and restaurants. We decided to eat out so found a German restaurant which we thought would be a nice change but it turned out to be owned by yet another wacko. This guy, Heinz, was born in Dresden but left Germany at aged 6. He began by stating how much he hated Americans for “everything they are doing to the world”. He was actually quite rude seeing as how he had two American customers in front of him but he was obviously weird. He talked at length about his life so far and how his inspiration in all things was Jonathon Livingston Seagull (do you know this? – its about striving for the impossible and is the type of thing they bring out at management conferences – pretentious rubbish!). Apart from slagging off Americans, he said that although he allows the Chinese to eat in his restaurant, he makes them sit outside because “they eat like pigs” but even they do better than the Japanese who are not even allowed in! He warmed to Gordon, told him he looked like a school teacher, and talked to him at length even escorting him to the door but the rest of us got the cold shoulder. And anyway, the food wasn’t much cop and the wine was rubbish!

We spent the next morning and early afternoon visiting some wineries and sampling the local wines. We thought the best was Peter Leiman’s where we also had a lovely lunch sitting in the garden and watching the lovely Australian birds.