We had our final showers in our little ensuite and set about making everything road safe in the van. Just after 9 we left the beautiful town of Mount Gambier.

First stop Tantanoola Caves for the 10.00 tour. We got there a little early and had time to do the little cliff walk loop before the tour started. Discovered in 1930, it’s a very rare cave being of dolomite formation. We have never seen so many stalactites, stalagmites and columns, it was amazing!

With a quick stop in Millicent to get fuel (now $2.89 a litre – gulp) we found Andy’s Bakery and grabbed a couple of pies for a snack. 

Only 5 mins up the road we stopped to walk around Lake McIntyre. 

Next we saw a place on the map that reminded us of home so a short detour to Southend was called for. 

So it has it’s similarities, a beach and a pier, but slightly more sunshine and definitely less people! (no Wetherspoon’s though). A very cute place with some nice houses and a book swap in a fridge which I took advantage of and swapped a romantic novel set in Victoria by best selling Australian author Rachel Johns (which Elaine had given me) for something else.

We had a small lunch by the beach and then headed off to Robe. Unfortunately the most direct road was closed so we now faced a 30 min detour! 

To break the one hour journey we stopped for 5 minutes at Woakwine Cutting. An impressive 1km long, 28 metre deep cutting in the limestone done by a farmer in the 1950’s to drain his fields. The machinery used was also on display.

Then onto Robe, a quaint town back on the coast. We checked into our campsite and then drove into Robe to get the layout of it. We drove down to the end of the peninsula but unfortunately we couldn’t get to the Obelisk as presumably the limestone is unsafe but we saw the ruins of the old gaol. With a quick drink in The Caledonian Inn (booked for dinner) we dropped the campervan back to site, dressed up a little and then took the cliff path back into town for dinner.

I ordered crayfish (lobster) and Dave the kangaroo, both were delicious, the kangaroo giving us venison vibes.

With no other pubs in town it was a quick walk back (along the road this time) trying to beat the sun going down. We failed and got back just after dark!