Tony
No flow to
the river but have a good run through the bush, Malee Cliffs State Forest to
the east, Lambert Island Nature Conservation Reserve to the west as I paddle
northwards. There’s loads of wildlife – roos, emus, ducks and other birds,
sheep and billy goats. I see a ‘big red’ roo, must have been 6ft tall, eating
grass over the water – I didn’t think they had big reds down in Victoria. Get a
picture of some old dead trees at the water’s edge, it’s not all pretty through
here! They go on for a couple of kilometres - it looked like hurricane damage. Pass
an old shack which has loads of stripes on it from various floods – boy, I bet
that placecould tell a few stories!
Top marks
to whoever named Red Cliffs! Very high cliffs through here. A few times I turn
a corner and can see a couple of kilometres down almost straight river and I
think ‘how am I going to get to the other end of that?!’ But I use markers along
the stretch to break it down into chunks, like I do with many obstacles or big tasks
in life. It’s a good job this isn’t a straight canal I’m paddling – I don’t
know how I’d get back on the river each morning if it was just like a road
running to a point on the horizon!
20km from
Mildura, the houseboats start and I push to the finish. A couple of houseboats
cut me off and one makes a sudden stop to moor up – a pretty impressive maneuver!
It’s been like a mill pond all day and hard work. Good for on-board photography
though – great reflections! There’s some goat kids playing and when I get close
they scamper around and climb onto a tree.
On arrival in
Mildura, I pass under the George Chaffey Bridge and get out at the Buronga Riverside
Caravan Park – thanks to Gay and Clinton for donating a site on the river front
to us. We meet the people from the Sunraysia Daily newspaper, thanks for the
publicity, guys!
Pan
Everything
was going well today, so I thought ‘this isn’t right, the day wouldn’t be
complete without me completely messing up, losing or breaking something’! So, I
went to reconnect the caravan to the car so that we can drive to the other side
of the lock in the morning because it’ll be too early for the lockmaster to let
Tony through. The van is sitting partly on sand and I can’t raise the jockey
wheel, it keeps digging into the sand. I turn the handle the other way so I can
unlock the wheel and slide a block of wood underneath, but the handle breaks off
in my hand and the front of the caravan lurches down to the ground. Damn it,
not again! I find Tony, who comes to the rescue again and doesn’t even get
angry – thanks, mate! Well, I guess he’s used to it by now. Everyone we meet jokes
that an Australian paddling down the Murray with only a pom for help is a
recipe for disaster and they’ve no idea how right they are! We console
ourselves with some beaut burgers topped with fried eggs, cooked by Tony as I put up my tent – good work, skipper!
Distance paddled: 64 km
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