After the ride in the ferry, we went to Sundowner Campground in the western part of Melbourne – this time with two frozen princesses (thanks to face painting on the ferry). The next day, we had a few things to do: Noras hiking boots needed a cobbler, we had to pick up two new iPads from Apple (Daniela’s old one was stolen or found and immediately taken at South Cape in Tasmania- and Markus had discovered the advantages of an iPad…) and Nora’s arm had to be xrayed again – luckily, it is healing well.
On the ship we heard about Ballarat, an old gold mining town. We visited the place the next day, we could wash gold ourselves in a little river, they showed craftsmen around 1850 und – for the children- there was a sweets making show with degustation. The Kids had the opportunity to be rich for some seconds, while holding a freshly poured goldbar of 3 kg (150’000$AU) in their hands!

Via Geelong we drove towards the Great Ocean Road, where you drive along the ocean for quite some time. We spent the next night at Cape Otway on the “Bimbi – Camping under koalas”and indeed, we discovered some grey furballs in the trees.

After another 150km Great Ocean Road, in Warrnambool we turned inland towards the Grampians. We spent the night at Plantation Campground and the next day, we hiked to the “Pinnacles” before continuing to Lake Albacutya, where we spent the night.

It was considerably warmer than at the coast and also our old friends – the sandflies! – were back. The next day, we went on in deep sand into the Wyperfeld National Park. We had to lower our already low tyre pressure at one dune to climb it – at another dune, Markus was so fast that a wine bottle broke and we lost the rear number plate. Fortunately, we realized it 25km later, drove back and found it (since the front number plate is already a fake one!).
Afterwards we continued further northwards to the Murray-Sunset park to the “Pink Lakes”, where we spent the night at Lake Hardie, a dry salt lake (it is really pink, due to betacarotin-producing algae!). The next day we drove on sand- and dirtroads through the Murray-Sunset Park and crossed the border to South Australia close to Meribah. We had to eat up all fruits and vegetables before – each state has its own regulation for the import of plant products.

We went on towards Port Augusta and passed a night with the so far most mosquitoes (huge mosquito swarms right after sunset) close to Port Pirie at “Newoora Playground” – no wonder, there was a swamp right next to it.
In Port Augusta we visited the “Wadlata Outback Centre” – a good exhibition with interesting films and information concerning the outback.
In the swimmingpool of the Big 4- campground we could cool down and even Nora (the “one-finned fish” with arm Ding) and Fiona were again clean. Since the campground had an oven, we had self-made cake and bread !
The next day, we went to Port Lincoln, where we bought fresh fish and prawns before heading to “Mikkira Station”. There are currently living around 100 koalas (they were brough there 40 years ago). We slept under an eucalyptus tree, saw a few animals and the next morning, two koalas were even watching us having breakfast.

When we visited Lincoln National Park the next morning, there was a seal splashing around right next to the shore at Cape Donnington and some of its friends were sitting on the nearby island. We drove back to Eyre Highway and they towards the Gawler Ranges and spent the night at Pildappa Rock.
The rock has a similar shape as the west australian Wave Rock, only smaller. Therefore, we had it to ourselves and climbed up at night to admire the stars. The next morning, we went on to the “Organ Pipes” (basalt formations in shape of organ pipes – just those we saw in Namibia were more impressive).

In Ceduna, we filled up our tank and the jerrycans, the next night we spent at Cactus Beach – around 80 km west of Ceduna.
Now the Nullarbor Plain was waiting for us. For the kids, we installed our laptop between the front seats to watch movies – with Mickey Mouse, the Jungle Book and Blinky Bill the time on the 1000 km long distance in two days passed rapidly.