Rainy day .... no trip to Mungo today June 27th

We were planning to go to Mungo National Park today, but it rained in the night and we are aware that the track might be a bit less driveable there today, so we left that on the "to do" list and had a lazy morning (finally almost finishing putting together a photo book of our China trip in March) . We only ventured out in time to have lunch at Andy's Kitchen (very nice asian food and very friendly) before we decided we must have some exercise and agreed to go and walk those wetlands that we saw yesterday.

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These wetlands drain a good portion of Mildura's stormwater and filter the water, but the walk was a bit underwhelming.  There were not many birds around (maybe the cat we saw had been busy??) and it was hard to get scenic views of the wetlands themselves.

Even the bird hide didn't help us much.
They have experimental floating islands which we think we spotted, but were also not very impressive. (although the pigeons seem to like them)

The walk was good for the sake of a walk, but we decided we needed a little more, so we drove over the big bridge once more and headed to the Inland Botanic Gardens. By the time we arrived we had about 45 minutes until closing time so we made the most of it.
Here we visited some roses. These are my favourites today...

Jubilee 150

Corso

Iceberg

Helmut Schmidt

We then had a bit of a rapid walk to see the "WOW Tree" which is a 2500 year old Mallee

before heading onward to admire the "Aussie Summerhouse" which boasts an amazing ceiling of seed pods.

Such variety of seed pod, and someone took a very long time putting this creative work together!!!

We took the self drive tour of the garden and stopped to admire the Sturt Desert Peas before making an exit before they locked us in.

There is a lot more to see in this botanic garden and it deserved at least a few hours of time to really see it properly, but it will have to wait for another visit from us. 

Butlers Creek kayaking - June 26th

Although the weather has got colder we decided that we can't leave with only one paddle done. So we put our wimpy wish for warm aside, rugged up a bit, hoped for dry paddling and headed back to the area near Butlers Creek. We found the Butlers creek picnic area , with a nice shallow launch spot, and took our chances.

Blocked!!

Initially we tried to go north towards Bruce's bend, but we were stopped within a couple of hundred metres by a fallen tree completely blocking the creek.  We turned, and headed south, hoping that we would not find the same thing just a little way downstream.  Lucky for us, we could sneak around the edge of the blockage in the other direction and this gave us the first of many challenges.  It was a day for finding a way through blockages, doing tight turns in shallow water, and bumping over hidden submerged logs.

we particularly admired this fallen tree which has turned into at least 6 trees now.  That is a great example of triumph in adversity. 

We were able to make our way all the way to Ducksfoot Lagoon, and to investigate as far as possible on every toe of the duck's foot before turning for home and our lunch.

By the time we made it back to the car the wind had risen a bit, and it was decidedly cooler.  We braved the breeze, having our picnic lunch at the table provided, before taking refuge with our warm cups of tea in the Prado.

We loaded up Ken and raced home to have a warm spa and defrost the frozen toes, only stopping to suss out the local wetlands in case we want to walk sometime. We even forgot to stop and get the paper, so we had to do without the cryptic crossword for a day.

We enjoyed a "Happy Hour" to meet other guests before having dinner at the resort restaurant.  We met John and Heather there. Heather recognised the Tintookies logo on my jumper  and it turned out that they used to orienteer in Pt Lincoln many years ago with their girls!!  It is such a small world.

driving, lunching, planning and eating. June 25th

Monday 25th was a quiet day.

We had to be up in time to have pancake breakfast supplied to us and enjoyed this along with many of the other guests staying here at Sunraysia resort. It was a good opportunithy to meet some of the others and we enjoyed getting to know two Ians and their wives -
Rosemary (with the Ian from Warracknabeal who is a massage) and Val (with the one from Dromana on the Mornington Peninsula).  We talked of timeshare, Kokoda, Kayaking and bad holiday experiences and planed to meet up again later in the week at another event.

Trevor and I walked out to get the paper and came home and did the crossword, before heading off to the Gol Gol pub for lunch, where we had a delightful lunch (and too much tasty dessert) looking out over the lawns to the river.

We walked down to the river edge after lunch, and then along to see the kayak launching spot close by in the public park, which we could use later in the week.  There is lots of council work going on here, with use of recycled plastic material in the form of planks for the retaining walls, picnic tables and seats and bollards.   

Trev spotted some parrots in the dead tree just nearby. Male outclassing the female in bright colours as usual.  Lots of pairs of birds guarding their various nests.

We wandered the river tracks on the NSW side of the river, taking note of possible launching spots in case we decide to try to reinvestigate the area near Green point. ((just past 896). Some of the river bank is newly fenced here.  It seems you can privately own the riverbank.

We took a few tracks on the way home, particularly the river flats just near the end of the bridge on the NSW side.  There is a caravan park here that has some really cute little sculptures on their lawn.

 If a bird came to drink this would look like the little girl was chatting to the bird  :)

Launch day for Ken July 24th 2018

Today was a big day for Ken the kayak.
After all this planning and waiting he hit the water at last - and he did it in style.

The weather man said it would only get to 13 degrees, so we rugged up and headed out anyway. We had a thermos and packed lunch just in case we found somewhere nice to stop midway through the paddle.

The Psyche pump area had a great canoe launcher to use, so Ken's first taste of the water was gentle and controlled and his owners were pretty happy to stay dry too.

The sun came out as we cruised along, and the swans and ducks might have been panicking about the paddlers coming along, but we still got a good look at the pelicans, hawks and a number of other birds in the area. At times it was very noisy with honking, quacking and carrying on - quite a circus.  At others we drifted quietly.   Swans can run on the water a very long way before they take off or give up. 

marvellous...

swan- didn't want to know us

well fed hawks

saw a few of these well dressed ducks - going out to dinner? 

not a sculpture

What a moment... so many birds taking flight 

so many eggs

one lone bird amongst so many others

yes - these are nests- all packed in together.

to give alterations in water levels and allow the billabong to stay healthy

the pumping station- hard at work irrigating the fruit blocks of Mildura.

The clouds made way for sunshine, and the temperature climbed a little higher than expected as we ducked under the water regulator and paddled out into the Kings Billabong.

It took a few tries before we found a spot (near the bird hide)  to pull the kayak up on to the bank and have our lunch.  The weed made it difficult to get in and out, but we avoided the smelly mud (except for Trev's hat, which fell off) and headed back across the Billabong, enjoying the sunshine, the paddling, each others company and the sights and sounds.

Ken seems to glide beautifully and to be very well balanced.  If his behaviour today is anything to go by, we will have a very long and happy relationship with him.  We are already thinking about where the next launch might be as we drive around the Mildura area with Ken safely tied up on top.

We are waiting until tomorrow to see how the body feels.  We will plan the next paddling accordingly.

Planning Day July 23rd

After sleeping in (we are on holidays) we spent a good portion of the day driving river tracks and checking out potential launch sites for the kayak.

The first stop (recommended by the check in lady at our accommodation) was the local marina cafe (who hire out kayaks).  No luck there, but we did get some lovely views of some very classy houseboats and an early lunch.

Then on to the river tracks upstream of the marina. 
We identified about 5 different potential spots to put the kayak in the water , but the best by far was the amazing canoe launch site by the psyche bend pumping station, (rollers on a ramp down to the water) which couldn't really make it any easier.
The roads are dry at the moment (despite the fact it is mid-winter) , so getting to the site is not a problem either .

It is a little hard to tell what is a walking track and what is a driving track.... this did mean that there was a little reversing out of tight areas required.  Glad it isn't wet - there are some VERY DEEP holes in some of those roads from when it was muddy.

We saved the locations of the possible launch sites on the car garmin and headed home via the information centre and the shops.

We picked up a copy of the "Murray River Access" for the area (good river maps) at the info centre, along with some details about Mungo National Park.  Will probably head out there some time this week as well.

Mildura here we come -June 22nd 2018

Having purchased Ken the Kayak he needed a launch. Happily his arrival in our family coincided with a planned trip to Mildura, so we took him with us.

We needed to figure out how to get him on to the roof of the Prado, and this meant removing the second spare tyre, so we are hoping not to have bad tyre experiences this trip.

We had a later departure than planned (what's new?) due to the changes to the configuration on the roof, but still managed to be in Tailem Bend in time to catch the pasties at the bakery there and to find the sheep in the local park. I love that the "animal" population keeps on increasing in the main street of Tailem Bend and I love that the local kids get a look in on the fun and that they share it with all the passers by.

We took a road less travelled to take us up to the Riverland via Loxton (via Karoonda) . We have a couple of friends there who were long overdue for a visit and catch up.  Thanks for the afternoon tea, stimulating conversation and lovely views over your place Sandi and Brett.

Leaving on sunset meant that we were treated to tantalising views of the stunning bright sunset over still water as we headed on to Mildura. No safe pull over spot was offering, so we made do with a shot in the rear vision mirror , and saving the memory for later.

We arrived safely in Mildura well after dark, but with no scary happenings on the way involving wildlife. This made us very happy.  We used the "late check in" facility to grab -out room key from the locked box and found our home for the next week just sitting and waiting for us.  We have a spa!!
Dropped into bed after our day of travelling.