Tuesday 11th Sept 2018. Burra to Clare.
This morning we packed up the van and got away around 10am. We headed to Clare, about 43km away, or a bit over 30mins. Rather than head straight there and get to the caravan park too early to check-in (most parks say 2pm check-in, but you can normally get in from midday onwards) we took the long way via Mintaro. Our plan was to have a look around the Heritage listed Mintaro House (it has been used for many TV shows and films).
It was a slow trip there, the weather wasn’t playing nice, high winds and towing a big van aren’t a good combination. We arrived at Mintaro House around 10:45am, it didn’t open until 11am, so we relaxed waiting for it to open. Then we (Deb) read the sign again! Mintaro House is closed on Tuesdays, of course it is!!!
So we enjoyed the countryside a bit more while we drove to Clare. We walked around town for a bit then drove down to the caravan park and checked in at 11:30am without any problems, they aren’t busy so all was sweet.
Deb had a quiet afternoon in the van, so I went out and explored the Clare township (played Ingress for a couple of hours).
We have been thinking for a while now that we should sell our van. And have decided that this is our last trip in it. It will be sad to let it go, there have been many happy travels in it, but it is time. So we started sorting thing out a bit, deciding what to leave in it and what to take home or throw out. Easy choices in the end.
Wednesday 12th Sept 2018. Clare, Auburn and Sevenhill.
Happy Birthday Von, hope you had a great day celebrating. ??
We were on the road around 10am and headed down to Auburn. We had a walk around the village admiring all the old buildings and history before going off to Grosser Wines to taste their wares. They do Riesling very well. We just had to take a few home. ?
From there we went to the Sevenhill Hotel for lunch, it continually gets awards for great food. Deb had a Pork Curry and I had North African Lamb Shanks. We were both underwhelmed, the pork was too subtle for the curry and my lamb needed a few more hours in a slow oven. We did take a walk down the ramps to their cellar, most impressive. A great selection of many fine local wines.
Next we went to the cellar door of Shut the Gate Wines. It’s owned by a couple of young guys, they don’t have their own vines, but select the grapes they want from preferred vineyards and make their wine from those grapes. They are very good at what they do and their wines are reasonably priced. We bought a few more bottles. ??
We head home tomorrow, so we took the car through a car wash in Clare, and then came back to the caravan park. I gave the van a wash, it was surprisingly clean for the places we had been. Deb did a bit cleaning on the inside then some research on selling the van and then we had a quiet afternoon. The caravan park does a “Roast meat rolls & Gravy Night” on Wednesdays to raise money for Variety, so that will be our dinner tonight.
We will do a bit more to the van tomorrow then head back to Adelaide around 11:30’ish.
It’s kind of sad that this is the end of our caravanning. ?
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