Diesel had headed from Deloraine for a campsite along the road to the Gordon Dam yesterday afternoon and the plan was for me to scoop him up on the way through.
Unfortunately, I had a bit of a slow start that day and was over an hour later than expected. I knew he’d just head to the dam wall. Sure enough – he was there waiting for me. His story of spending the night alone with a campfire under the stars, a changing colourscape on the cliffs above him, and nothing else but silence and a bottle of red made me envious – maybe somewhere else down the track we could repeat it.
Holy shit! The dam wall was impressive. 140m tall (we found out later) and the view from the top was incredible. Photos will never do it justice, but…
Of course we had to head down the steps and walk across the dam wall itself. The steps testing the vertigo first… but since the wall is curved back underneath, you have to lean right over the wall to see it below.
While we were there, there were some crazy people being lowered down by rope (not really abseiling) to the bottom.
After saying “wow” about a thousand times, jumped back on the bikes and headed off. Just back up the road was a lookout for Lake Pedder. Wow again… just stunning:
We hit the twisties and discovered that you don’t need to go far for the scenery to change dramatically.
While Diesel grabbed some lunch and fuel, I popped into to Russell Falls – not a long walk of the road:
We ended up in Bothwell at the local caravan park and acquired a bottle of CabSav at the pub. It barely touched the sides. We’d changed our minds and thought a pub meal would be good (probably due to the vino) but found out, being a good ole country town), the kitchen closed early and we were forced to cook ourselves. We both had soup, but I’d also had a can of Spam in my trailer since Rockhampton and I thought it was about time I tried it – again, that might have been the vino.
During the evening the park’s caretaker (Peta) joined us, Diesel acquired another bottle of the good stuff, force me to drink it again, and we all had a fairly “merry” time. Diesel & Peta tried a little of the Spam, but left me to eat most of it. I can’t say I hated it, but I’m not sure I’ll buy it again.
Today was a great day and it will be hard to beat!