Day 11 - Kangaroo Island

First stop for the day
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We had a big day in front of us – “hyperactive day”. A trip that people normally do in three days we tried to squeeze into one. From Kingscote we drove north to Emu Bay. Despite there being a normal road, we decided to try the four wheel capabilities of our vehicle and drove on a back road. Emu bay has a nice large sandy beach and deep blue water. The highlight for us was the fact that we could drive on the sandy beach. We had a good start, until we wanted to turn back where the engine stopped and we got the wheels stuck in the sand. Yikessss here comes the first trouble of the trip! We managed to get it out – luckily we saw the video presentation about the 4WD. We drove from Emu bay to Stokes Bay – nothing much besides rocks and a rock pool until you walk through a tunnel on the east side which brings you to a very pretty spot.

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The drive on North Coast is mostly on dirt road and the vegetation on both side of the road is dense with bushes, trees and grass. We almost had kangaroo meat for lunch. Two kangaroo’s jumped from the right side onto the road and with two hops they were in front of the car. We jammed the breaks, the wheels skidded and the car slowed down, but still closing in to the kangaroos. Just a few centimetres before hitting them, the car came to a halt by hitting the rim of the road. The kangaroos got away, the car was still working and we drove on with a heightened Adrenaline level.

Amazing stone formation...
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We stopped at Snelling Beach. We had a nice view coming down the road leading to the beach area. This beach houses an almost extinct breed or bird (can’t remember the name J. There weren’t many but we saw a few and the funny thing we think about it was that we got closer to it ran and not fly away only when we were about 1 foot length away it flew away.

The next stop was Cape Borda Lighthouse.  A must visit, it sits at the highest point of South Australia. It was 2.45 p.m. and the last tour was at 2.30, we still decided to walk around and see the place. We went to the shop and the nice “Lighthouse” keeper said that he’d be happy to run a tour just for us. It was a very informative and interesting tour. The light house itself is not very tall as it already sits on a high point. It took the men 4 months to built it up. The best bit about the tour is the fact that we could fire the cannon! Although it wasn’t 1 p.m. we still were allowed to do it.

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From the Lighthouse we wanted to cut across Shackle Road but it was closed so we drove to Cape du Couedic via the Highway. One thing we’ve learnt so far is that THIS ISLAND IS VERY BIG. We drove to the Flinders Chase National Park to see the Remarkable Rocks and the New Zealand Fur Seal. The rock formation although natural looked like someone had carefully placed an carved them. When you see the pictures you will know the difficulty we had initially spotting the seals. They are black and so are the rocks. We walked along the path and came to a magnificent hidden view to the sea through the rock formation – Admirable Rocks.

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We were rushing at this point as we had an appointment at 6 p.m. with the Quad Bikers in Vivonne Bay about 1 hour away and it was now 5.15. We decided that if we make it we it great if not its fine. On the way to Vivonne Bay we say a Black Snake slithering on the road. Although we drove past it we had to turn back for a picture. We reached Vivonne Bay at 6.15 and the tour hadn’t left yet – Lucky us. We managed to do the Dusk Quad Bike Tour which is really fun...bumpy but fun!

We decided to call it a day, no knowing at this point where we were going to stay. We drove to Kingscote but the camping ground we stayed the night before was closed so we headed towards the town and had dinner then went to the pub (Still no place to camp). We played pool had beers met new friends and later drove to the beach side and parked for the night.