Places We Like to Nomad: Blown Away by the Coorong

The day after leaving Kangaroo Island we drove around the Fleurieu Peninsula with a lunchstop overlooking Tunkalilla Beach. The jolly, bearded local farmer met us in the road and stopped for a chat – I felt mildly guilty that I had just been caught short in his field and for a second thought he was stopping to remonstrate.

For three nights we stayed at the Goolwa Caravan Park, a whirl of barking dogs, cycling kids, and assorted old-timers in old Jayco caravans who bustled around with toolboxes and drills fixing their mates’ radio antennae so we could all enjoy local radio for the evening hours.

On Sunday, we took the 6 hour boat cruise into the Coorong. We started the day visiting the barrages, where fur seals competed with pelicans for fish.

We motored past fishing boats and remote campers to moor for a walk from the inner lagoon to the dunes and wide open seashore where we saw 4WD tracks carefully avoiding the tide along the 100km beach. Remote bush camping tucked away in the sand dunes is the way to progress down the coastline.

The guides cooked up cockles in white wine, chilli and hoisin sauce as appetiser then gave us a massive boxed salad lunch. The cockle industry is now a major industry earning millions of dollars with exports to the EU just approved.

The Murray Mouth was an imposing sight as we passed shallow waters with 4WDs and fishermen seemingly walking on water with the stunning backdrop of the crashing surf beyond. Political issues govern the taking of water for irrigation all the way, 1000s of kms upstream, until the mouth is left with just a trickle, barely that even, during years of drought. The mouth has shifted several kms over the years and it silted up with no outflow for the first time in 1984. Dredging alleviated the problem and the plan now is to assign more water to keep the river stable in its environment.

En route we saw ancient shacks still used by fishermen and cocklers, but now no longer being passed on via inheritance because the Coorong National Park dismantles or takes over to preserve the environment. This one had lost a sea wall to storms and hastily put up a steel replacement.

Moving up the Coorong, the tour took us to a freshwater soak where we followed a steep path up and over sand dunes which opened into a wide plateau dotted with aboriginal middens, or ancient discarded seashell sites, including human bones. The place had a wild feel of how it was to live here many thousands of years ago hunting cockles, emu, kangaroo; fishing for mullaway, huge fish from the surf.

On the last night, I had just filled our metho stove when it jammed open and alight when the poxy gas lighter lost a bit inside it. Casting around for some ideas on what to do to put the thing out, I asked a group nearby for advice. A friendly bloke called Kev said he happened to be an ex-CFS (Community Fire Service) officer of 20 years’ standing. Kev said he hadn’t seen a metho stove for 20 years and suggested we leave the stove on full throttle outside to burn off the fuel. Kev was a 4WD enthusiast and had been out to the Murray Mouth a few times – his advice was to time the trip right so as not to get caught up against the dunes by the tide. Gen and I watched outside until almost midnight, shepherding our fuel burn-off and guiltily shielding the naked flame because we were under Total Fire Ban.

Apart from inadvertently pinching Gen's finger, crafty work jemmying with a screwdriver fixed the metho stove and we set off first with a wide loop around Lakes Albert and Alexandrina, past a saline lake, then through the Coorong to bush camp for two days on a splendid peninsula called Parnka Point. What a perfect place for the New Year - birdlife galore, wild walks, and fiery sunset.

The arrival of rainy weather sent us off on the long road home to Sydney via Salt Creek with its humorous roadsign and its Loop Road where there was a beautiful pink halite lake.