Finally Fish!! and haystacks, 4WD and glorious scenery

Next stop Tumby Bay. We spent the night near the jetty, while Trucky again took the rod out. This time, with a bit of advice from a local (and the recipe for “magic goo”) Trucky managed to catch about 15 Tommy Ruffs! Woohoo! A successful fisherman makes for a happier travelling companion…

From Tumby Bay we drove around the base of the Eyre Peninsula, filled up with diesel at Port Lincoln, and headed around to Venus Bay. All the coastline was gorgeous. I’m starting to feel like this trip is no where near long enough to do justice to this amazing coutry. I’d like a lot longer at each place, and more time to see other places in between. (need to win Lotto…need to win Lotto…etc, etc)

We spent the night at Murphy’s Haystacks, a big inselberg formation near Streaky Bay. It was fantastic waking up to see the sun coming up over these amazing rocks. From there we followed the signs to Port Labatt to see the sea lions. (Bad move to take the bus: 17km of very rough dirt road to get there) Once there though, we were lucky enough to see about 60 sea lions, sunning themselves, frolicking in the water or hooning around on the sand. We also met up again with Gordon and Julie who we’d met at the haystacks earlier.

On their suggestion, we checked into the caravan park at Streaky Bay and took Terry our now very dirty 4WD exploring the Westall Way Loop. We spent a couple of hours exploring rock pools and climbing around cliffs, but the highlight for Trucky and Alex was the chance to do some proper 4WDing in the little car. Up and down sand dunes, along cliff edges at Speedes Point, right down onto the beach at Smooth Pool. Since the car is so small and light it got into places larger vehicles wouldn’t. Jess and I were pretty excited because we managed to climb down the cliff onto to the beach at the end of Speedes Point. I’m sure there are not too many people in the world who’ve been to this little beach!

Alex and Trucky went fishing that evening and had further success. They were so excited that they came back to the bus about 1030pm and made us all go out to the jetty. It was freeing cold, but we all managed to catch a couple of fish each. Home after midnight, frozen solid and exhausted. It was probably the best day yet!!