Preparing to Cross the Nullarbor

Manda writes:

It was an early start for us today as we had an appointment with the garage folk. We took Ethel to the other side of town for an oil change and a service, just to make sure she's still in good shape for the big journey over The Nullarbor Plain to Perth. After an in-depth inspection, Ethel was given a clean bill of health, so it looks like we are all set to make a start on the 2,700km journey tomorrow. A daunting task for us but Ethel is taking things in her stride!

The mechanics finished the job quicker than we'd expected and with a few extra hours to kill, we took a drive over to Glenelg. This town is just 10km from the centre of Adelaide and has a nice marina and a beach. There weren't many people milling around but I can imagine this place being very popular in the summer. We bought a couple of ice creams and took a stroll down the beach. This place reminds me of a cross between the Gold Coast (with accommodation lined closely alongside the beach) and Ocean Village in Southampton, UK (with many boats and eateries around the marina). It was a nice day for a mooch around the area and the ice cream went down a treat.

Holdfast Marina, in Glenelg, south-west of Adelaide CBD.

We took another trip up to Mount Lofty but unfortunately the skies had turned overcast by the time we got there. It wasn't as cold as the last time we were there but the visibility hadn't improved much either. It was worth a try!

Back in the centre, we tried to find a lookout point that we'd seen on a fridge magnet of the high-rise buildings in Adelaide. On our travels so far, we have restricted our souvenir buying to fridge magnets (they're cheap and they don't weigh much - perfect for backpackers!). We found the location, pinpointed to Brougham Place, but the picture on the magnet looked like it was taken from a higher viewpoint, like from the roof-top of the hotel situated on the corner - right place, wrong elevation. We decided not to get a room on the top floor of the hotel and made do with street level views instead!

St Peter's Cathedral with Adelaide's CBD in the background.

Happy that we have covered everything we wanted to do and see in Adelaide, we went back to the campsite. We have prepared Ethel as much as possible for the journey ahead, now we just need to prepare ourselves for the long distances.