McCulloch Family Road Trip: Heart Attack Tuesday

Well we work up and decided to head towards Morgan, but then Jason had a chat to our neighbours and he recommended a free campsite that they had stumbled across at Cadell (a whole 10 km further down the road), so that was our new aim for the day. All the towns along the Murray seem quite close and it wasn’t long until we were in Mannum and the ole Jayco (van) had its first ride on a ferry. Mannum is certainly very pretty but not much was happening.

Hamish's new tantrums. He says 'you are not my friend anymore'

and then proceeds to just walk away and stand with his back to you sulking!

So funny.

Kayla having her breakfast.

We thought that this would be where we did the paddle steamer ride however the information centre informed us that they don’t start running until the end of May, and this is the case for all paddle steamers in SA!!! Odd I thought as it would have been iconic to do it in the birthplace of the paddle steamer but so be it. That is now on the NSW Murray River list of things to do.

The jayco's first ferry ride.

Morning tea watching the ferries.

So with not much else to do we set off again and came across some people spots and lookouts over the Murray River, highlighting the cliffs. The two best places are Walkers Flat and the Big Bend. We stopped in walkers flat with another ferry crossing and enjoyed the view before setting off to find a lookout that the local had told us about. A few too many U-turns later we did find it and well it honestly was not really worth the hassle (remembering we had the van attached).

Looking down on Walkers Flat

The other direction of Walkers Flat

Taken from the ferry looking back from Walkers Flat.

Big Bend lookout.

We then briefly stopped at … to have a look at the first lock on the Murray and the pelicans feeding. Both children were asleep so we were not going to waste the opportunity to keep moving. As we were driving the trip odometer clicked over 3000km – not bad for only 1 ½ weeks. I think we need to give our poor car a bit of a rest!

Spot all the pelicans.

The countryside along the Murray is really not what I expected. Again I was looking for green pastures with fat cattle and sheep. Nope, it is dry country for most of the trip, and I think early explorers could have easily missed the Murray River. Thought we got excited when just randomly an orchard would appear, and then disappear just as quick.

Captain obvious!

Finding the free camp ground proved to be a little more difficult than expected. This may have something to do with instructions Jason was given or vital questions weren’t asked J. Anyhow we headed down to the ferry to cross the river. We were third in the line, with a massive tow vehicle (5^th wheeler) in front of us. We didn’t proceed down the hill as I thought we could be pushing it but the ferry driver waved us down. Now this caused a bit of a panic as we didn’t fit at all and the hill was too steep to reverse up with the van and there was no potential to turn around.

So we had to go back as far as we could and then the other van had to reverse to move more to the right. The heart attack nearly happened when the massive 5^th wheeler was reversing and we thought he was going to hit us. Little did we know he actually had a reversing camera on top of his mini house he was towing! He did manage to move more right and we just squeezed on (heart in our throats), only to ask the ferry driver where the free campsite was and long and behold it was on the side of the river we just left. Needless to say we got off the ferry, went up the road, turned around and waited to go back over. I think we provided the ferry driver with his excitement for the day. However he did say that if this was the worst thing that goes wrong for us today than we are having a good day. He was right.

Was the campsite worth all the hassle? Most definitely yes! It was a beautiful secluded area with just 4 other vans. One couple had stayed there over 5 times they just love it. It was quiet and overlooked some cliffs, but the best parts were at night the lights turned on which highlighted the gumtrees and cast shadows on the cliffs. It was truly a magical place and one we would have stayed at longer had we had a van with a shower.