Sun, 7th Feb, 2016 Showgrounds RV Park, Murray Bridge to Queen Victoria Jubilee Park, Williamstown, SA (Whispering Wall & Herbig Tree)

7.30am 22 degrees, overcast and windy.

Packed up and headed over the bridge for our last crossing of the River Murray.

The wind has blown all the clouds away as we head north through rolling hills.

Crossed over the Mannum to Adelaide water pipeline near Palmer.

Up and over the hills covered in huge granite boulders that the graffiti artists use as notice boards!!

Over the hill and the pipeline continues on.

Over the pipeline again at Tungkilo.

Nice drive over the country roads – a bit bumpy!! Across Warren Reservoir.

Through Crawford State Forest – the burnt area.

The van park is just out of Williamstown. It is a council one beside an oval and swimming pool. Nice shady trees but we should get good solar in the afternoon.

Steve happy as there is TV reception so he settled in to watch the Bathurst 12 hour for a while.

Margaret and Gary arrived in the afternoon with a couple of bottles of lovely wine from their friend’s wineries. I said how Diane loves the fish brand – Pike, Margaret said they were their friends, surname of Pike just like the fish, hence the logo. Hoping the weather is good next week to go down to their place at Marion Bay and do some fishing.

Jumped in their car and went to check out the Whispering Wall. A curved dam, built in 1902, creating the Barossa Reservoir, which receives water from South Para River to supply water to the city of Gawler.

Margaret stayed on this side on a platform just below the top of the wall and we walked across to the other side.

Looking over the water then down the other side of the wall.

Doesn’t curve in as much as Gordon Dam did – you could abseil down this one and keep your feet on the wall.

Across the other side and we walked down a little bit to the whispering post. Zoomed in on Margaret on the other side 140m away. Then chatted away to her via the wall – amazing.

Back through Williamstown and down to Springton to the Herbig Tree, well & trough. Checked out the well first and sadly Margaret leant over the grate and her key pendant must have slipped into the grill and when she stood up it broke off and went into the well. So sad as it was a gift from her friends when she was 21. We wanted to pull off the top and go down to try and find it, but we didn’t have anything to pull the grate off with.

Walked over to the tree. Amazing story of a family living in this tree for 5 years from 1855.

After another look down the well we headed back to the van park for a cuppa and some banana cake that I baked this morning.

The sun disappeared behind the trees at 8.15 and then the temperature dropped so closed up the windows.

A new arrival lady asked about TV reception as she couldn’t get it where they were as she wanted to watch Molly (Molly Meldrum) tonight. We were going to watch it so I taped it so she can watch it tomorrow.