Around The Yorke Peninsula: Marion Bay to Dunns Point By Sea Kayak

 Shuttling:

The day before we left on this trip Doug got up early and drove our car up to Dunns Point and cycled about 40 kilometres back to the where we were staying at the caravan park in Marion Bay, both on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia.

We have a long history with bicycle shuttles. In 2007, we pioneered a ski traverse through the West Arm Provincial Park near Nelson, BC, skiing along the divide and over several peaks to reach the small community of Proctor on the West Arm of Kootenay Lake. On that trip, I cycled 40 kilometres from Proctor back to Nelson to pick up our car. Apart from being passed by several lycra clad road bikers the cycle, even after skiing all day, was not that hard, because we were pretty fit after a long winter season of industrial trail breaking in the Kootenays.

Three years later, Doug did a much more challenging bicycle shuttle when we skied a two day route over three Kokanee Range peaks. His shuttle involved riding up a steep, alternately loose, muddy, rocky logging road to 1100 metres at the peak of spring break up. Apparently, it was pretty glycolitic. At the time, I was lounging about in a patch of early spring sunshine drinking tea and reading a trashy novel. Both trips are written up on Bivouac.com, but you have to be a member to read them.

Truth is, Doug is much fitter on the mountain bike than me, so he drew the shuttle straw while I packed up our gear for a three to four day sea kayak trip around the southern and western sides of the Yorke Peninsula. Our exact route on this trip was somewhat partially determined by what sort of shuttle we could manage with the bicycle in the absence of any kind of public transit. The other determination was not wanting to paddle a lot of long beaches which can be dreary in their sameness. Marion Bay to Dunns Point would capture the most interesting section of coast at a reasonable bicycle shuttle length.

Marion Bay to Browns Beach:

Early on our departure morning we walked through the Marion Bay Caravan Park multiple times carrying our kayaks and gear from our cut-rate location (furthest away from the water and closest to the rubbish bins) to the beach. Dozens of people watched us walk by but no-one said anything or asked what we were doing. Sometimes I think the more out of the ordinary you are, the more invisible you become.

We got away from Marion Bay at around 8.30 am heading southwest and paddling past Penguin Point, Rhino Head, and Stenhouse Bay. Bizarrely, the roughest water we had on the whole trip was around Penguin Point, closely followed by Rhino Head; both prominences had good amounts of clapotis and current effects.

West of Stenhouse Bay we passed tiny Chinamans Hat Island and had good views of Althorpe and Haystack Islands which we had paddled out to on a previous trip. At Cable Hut Bay we just managed to get into the small beach over a rapidly drying reef for a short break as we knew there would be no further landing points until we got to West Cape Bay.

The next section of the trip was the most spectacular and we had been looking forward to paddling past Cape Spencer and West Cape as the entire coastline along this section is high limestone cliffs off set by the clear green water of the Southern Ocean. It was very spectacular. We found caves and grottos, big cliffs, amphitheatres of sculpted limestone, stack like islands and crashing reefs.

Passing West Cape Lighthouse, we waved at the tourists lined up near the cliff-line but apparently they could not see us either. It was only lunch time when we arrived at West Cape Bay where we had planned to camp. It was hot, however, and we had to huddle in the shade of boulders to eat lunch. Too hot to stop to camp although it looked interesting to explore the coast on foot as there was not a sliver of reasonable shade anywhere.

So, we kept paddling, past the strange flat-topped islands near Pondalowie Bay and north to Roysten Head where we turned due east. A few kilometres beyond Roysten Head we found a sheltered landing on the far end of Browns Beach and landed our kayaks. It was about 3.30 pm and really hot in the sun. We managed to rig a tarp for shade but tarps are never as good as natural shade particularly on sand as the sun still reflects under the tarp. After a while, the hill side above camp got a bit of shade and we hid up there until it was cool enough to move around, set up the tent, and take a short walk before the sun went down. I walked up onto the dunes behind camp where you can look down on several salt lakes.

Browns Beach to Gleasons Landing:

While temperatures were still comfortable in the morning we went for a walk near camp before starting the days kayaking. I walked up onto the dunes behind camp and then easily walked along short limestone bluffs towards Royston Head. It was nice to have an alternate view of what we had paddled the day before.

Leaving Browns Beach, we headed straight north into a light wind pointing the kayaks at what I thought was Point Margaret. In the zone of paddling, Point Margaret seemed to take a long time to come closer, even allowing for paddling into the wind. Doug was behind me and stayed that way all morning. I kept checking that he was still following along and, as he was always just a couple of hundred metres behind, I kept going.

After a while it seemed that we had been paddling for a really long time without reaching Point Margaret and I felt like a break. Without a watch on, I had no idea how much time had passed. Finally, we got near a headland where we could stop without being blown back by the wind. While waiting for Doug, I checked the map and realised that we had paddled right past Point Margaret and were actually at Daly Head, almost to our planned camp for the night.

We had to detour out around a breaking reef and then paddled in along the shore on the north side of Daly Head past a couple of lovely little beaches to the tiny beach sheltered by reefs on both sides where there was good camping and a big cave above the beach that offered shade for the afternoon.

It was another afternoon spent hiding from the sun under the roof of the cave until it cooled off enough to put up our tent and then I went for a long walk south towards Daly Head. I walked along rocky reefs and sandy beaches as the sky glowed first with the blush of the setting sun and then the rising moon.

Gleasons Landing to Dunn Point:

Our last day on the water and we paddled north up the coast past little beaches and rocky headlands. Lots of great places to camp along this section of coast but not much in the way of shade. At Corny Point we paddled into a sheltered bay where there is a lighthouse and had a short break before rounding the headland and heading east to a very sheltered landing in shallow water at Dunn Point.

Back To Where We Began: Wombat Ridge, Pigeon House Mountain and Jindelara Creek

Heavy dew started at 5.00 pm, darkness fell at 5.30 pm, and by 6.00 pm we were in the tent for the night, the long night. I had forgotten how lengthy nights are in the Australian winter. Not as protracted as a Canadian winter, where the sun sets at 4.30 pm and does not reappear until 7.30 am, but long enough.

We were not quite where we had planned, but Budawang adventures seldom go according to plan. The scrub is notoriously dense, the wilderness designation means there is little to no track maintenance, up-to-date information is rare. Despite all the "hashtag" adventurers, most people who visit the Budawangs take one of a few standard routes leaving most of the wilderness area untouched.

My plan, which was too ambitious for both our bodies and the track conditions, was to walk from the Clyde River to Little Forest Plateau and back via a clockwise circle taking in Rusden Head, Florence Head, Wombat Ridge, Kingiman Ridge and Jindelara Creek.

That was the plan, and then there was reality. It is a direct and steep hike up the Bridle Fire Trail to Longfella Pass and the elevated plateau that runs from Pigeon House Mountain to Rusden Head. For the first six kilometres, the trail is open and easily followed. At the top of Longfella Pass there is a good view of Clyde Gorge and the peaks around Monolith Valley with Byangee Walls and The Castle prominent in the foreground.

North of Pigeon House Mountain we found a string of pink flagging tape marking the old track up the north side of Pigeon House and, although we have been up numerous times before, we decided to detour to the top via this alternate route. The old track basically goes straight uphill until it reaches the cliffs at the top at which point we circled anti-clockwise at the base of the cliffs until we came to the tourist ladders and were soon on top with a surprising number of people.

Back at our packs, we had lunch before continuing for another kilometre before we reached a junction. Wombat Ridge track forks left and is partially overgrown but passable with some pushing through scratchy burnt shrubs. Beyond the junction with the old Landslide Creek track, however, Wombat Ridge is heavily overgrown. At one section, we lost the track altogether and were pushing through tightly packed regrowth draped with tenacious vines. Progress slowed exponentially.

After a particularly bad bit of bush-thrashing, we decided to note where we were and proceed for half an hour so we could gauge our pace. We had four kilometres of trail and an equivalent number of kilometres of bush-whacking before we could even begin looking for one of the passes up onto Rusden Head. These passes are infrequently transited and we knew it would take time to find them. Then, of course, we would have to find a camp-site and water before darkness.

On our timed section, our pace improved as the track became clearer as the soil became poorer and we were managing about a kilometre in half an hour. Still, at this rate, we would be high on Wombat Ridge when light ran out with no flat ground and no water. I knew that there was a small dam along the ridge and this had always been the back-up camp option so we continued on until we arrived at what actually turned out to be a very pleasant camp site with views of Rusden and Florence Heads, Pigeon House Mountain and fresh water from the dam.

We had a much earned cup of tea and snack and then leaving Doug to put the tent up I headed off downhill to the east to scope out a route into Jindelara Creek. The topographic map shows small cliffs along several sections of Jindelara Creek but there are many more cliffs than shown and I had to traverse a distance before I found a pass down to the creek. I took a way point and then high tailed it back to camp to arrive just as dusk was settling in. All in all, the bush was not too bad, a somewhat misleading sample as it would turn out.

We had a damp night owing to heavy dew and a three season fully mesh tent, so I boiled water for coffee and porridge whilst still sitting in the tent doorway. Then we packed up and put on waterproof jackets for the very wet walk down to Jindelara Creek. Instead of simply turning around and walking back out, we had decided to at least walk some of the way out along Jindelara Creek. In theory, you could walk all the way down Jindelara Creek to where Pigeon House Fire Trail crosses the creek but we knew that would be very slow.

I had marked the spot where I had intersected the road the night before after coming up from the pass to Jindelara Creek so we headed downhill from there but somehow ended up downstream of the pass and had to travel further downstream again until we could find a pass that went right the way to the creek. Above the creek there are tiers of short cliffs and a pass must be found through each one.

When we reached the creek it was pretty walking: deep clear pools, short bluffs mostly along the east side of the creek, some flat rock slabs, but, as always in this kind of terrain, slow. There were piles of flood damaged trees stacked up from recent heavy rains and floods and we often had to scramble up above piles of timber then return back down to the creek.

After we had been walking for about two hours we stopped for a short break before continuing on. The creek narrowed abruptly ahead and several large fallen trees made for even slower more arduous travel. I managed to scrape my way through by climbing 30 metres up then descending again to the creek where I confronted flood timber stacked about four metres high along the steep banks of the creek.

This, we decided was far enough in the creek so we scrambled uphill quickly finding an easy pass through the cliffs above to a tributary creek flowing over sandstone where we filled our water bottles. Taking a compass bearing from our approximate location, a west-northwesterly bearing would intersect Wombat Ridge Fire Trail. And thus we embarked on some of the worst bushwacking I have encountered, and I have bushwacked through the Monashees!

Regrowth was spaced approximately a nanometre apart, well over head high and overlain with 45 metre long intertwined tendrils of vine with the tensile strength of graphene. As we moved forward - walking is not an appropriate term - our bodies would be draped about with vines reminiscent of Ulysses lashed to the mast of his ship to resist the songs of the Sirens. The only way to progress forward was to hurl your body against these binding vines until they finally gave way with such abruptness that, had there been a nanometre of space, we would have been thrown to the ground. As it was literally impossible to fall over, we would simply stagger forward into the next carapace of vines.

Eventually, after I had lost a hat and had a bandage stripped from my hands, and Doug's trousers were in tatters, we erupted onto Wombat Ridge trail and collapsed onto the ground for lunch. Disturbingly, when we checked our position on the map, although we had walked down Jindelara Creek for some distance and bush-whacked for two kilometres through green hell, we were less than a kilometre from where we had camped.

Unfortunately, we had one more section of thick viney regrowth on the way back where we completely lost the old road and ended up once more hurling ourselves against the resistance of the graphene vines before we somehow stumbled on the old road bed again.

At Longfella Pass we stopped for a rest overlooking Clyde Gorge and the main peaks of the Budawangs thinking that we had only an easy three kilometre walk down the fire trail to our car. I drank the remainder of my water before we left. Upon reaching a fire trail junction, we checked the map and confirmed, yes, we should go left and headed steeply downhill on a fire trail that looked increasingly unfamiliar to me. After we had descended perhaps a 100 metres (vertical) I called ahead to Doug and rechecking the map noted that we had been sucked into turning left when we should have gone right as the track junction shown on the map is not quite a four way. Back uphill we went, my tongue now stuck to the roof of my mouth with thirst. Right, then left, and then down and finally the Clyde River and our car.

Having An Adventure

I found the photo below on my mobile telephone yesterday when I was clearing out files and tidying away the last of my pictures from our South Australia trip. It is taken from a sandstone cliff top overlooking the Woronora River in the Sutherland Shire on the south side of Sydney. It looks like wilderness but is instead on the edges of Sydney and lapped on all sides by suburbia. I was doing what I do when in Sydney to visit my Mum, spending my spare time between visits with her either wandering in the woods or climbing on the boulders near my brother's house.

On this particular day, I was walking along a bit of track that I had stumbled onto late the evening before and had ear-marked as warranting further exploration. I am a sucker for a bit of track. If I find even the thinnest hint of a foot pad I simply must follow it to see where it goes. My significant other thinks this is my own particular brand of FOMO. Not fear of missing out on the deal of the month but the idea that I must see what is at the end of the track, on the other side of the island, or over the next ridge.

Soon after this photo, I came to a junction marked by an old sign. I took the left hand fork and found myself on an increasingly faint trail heading down towards the Woronora River. In parts, it was covered with bark and nearly overgrown, but, this was obviously once a passaged route. There were rough stone stairs in places and even a handrail in one spot. After a 100 metre descent, I came out at the river by a deep pool where the sun was shining through eucalyptus.

I was out of time and had to turn back, but, my eye, which is good at reading faint tracks and foot pads could discern a hint of track continuing on. Who knows where this track might lead? Clearly I would have to come back.

At the beginning of the pandemic, one of my nieces was forced to cancel her holiday to New Zealand and was lamenting the loss of this opportunity to adventure. I mentioned that she need not give up adventure as there are literally hundreds of places in NSW which offer adventure. Perhaps not on the scale of the New Zealand Alps but for my very urban niece, a bushwalk in the Budawangs, a sea kayak along the south coast, a descent of a canyon in the Colo, would all provide more adventure than she could handle comfortably. Given that being uncomfortable is what adventuring is all about you have instant adventure. With the conceit of youth, she "tsked" me and said that there was nothing adventurous she could do without getting on an aeroplane to New Zealand.

It is interesting how we have come as a society to define adventure. Merriam Webster defines adventure as an "exciting and remarkable experience" or "an undertaking usually involving danger and unknown risks." My niece thinks adventure can only be had in foreign lands under the guidance of professional "adventurers." One of my other young relatives has an even less inspiring definition of adventure as a short walk from the trail head because that is what most people are capable of.

My personal definition of adventure is more along the lines of Bilbo Baggins' idea: "nasty, disturbing, uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!" I am, however, a big fan of the idea of adventuring in your own space, near to where you live. Obviously, this is better for the planet; the less we all fly around in big jets the better off our environment will be. And, instead of everyone queuing up to get the same cookie cutter photo for anti-social media we might have truly unique experiences.

Ultimately, I think our youth are losing the ability to adventure which is, in its essence, simply walking beyond your furthest known point. Adventure, it seems, is now defined by a catchy hashtag on social media, and no other location will do.

On one trip to the Shire, after I had been rambling about in the woods for a few hours (my attempts to link various tracks together having ended, as they always do, with some minor bushwacking), I tried to encourage my young relatives to explore their own backyard. I explained how quickly they could get into the nearby bushland and that the cool thing about the Shire is that you can literally walk into the bush from almost any neighbourhood and keep walking for 20 or even 40 kilometres in any direction before you will encounter more suburbia. There are tracks everywhere, simply waiting to be discovered or rediscovered. The youth looked at me aghast: "But how will we know where we are going?" They asked. "You won't," I said, "and that's when you'll know you are having an adventure."

The Pink Period

I just finished listening to a podcast about getting more women into the sport of rock climbing. It was all about promoting "inclusivity," careful use of language, and making climbing accessible. And I am not opposed. I would love to see more women involved in all outdoor sports not just rock climbing. But, and isn't there always a "but" in my essays, I am not at all sure that the answer lies simply in providing feminine hygiene products in rock climbing gyms or avoiding gender charged terms. When we enter the realm of getting people into sports and activities they are not "really that into" in the first place, it is my experience that the newcomer to the sport is merely a transient visitor who never stays around for the long haul. This is not a gender issue, it is a human motivation issue.

My first foray into outdoor sports was scuba diving when I was 16. That was the earliest age a person could take instruction and get their open-water scuba diving ticket. Once I got my certification, I would badger my oldest brother - who could also dive and went on to become a marine biologist - to take me diving. Paying for the lessons had taken all my money and there was none left to pay for boat dives with commercial dive companies.

It did not take long to wear out my brothers enthusiasm, but luckily, before that had completely waned, I found the local dive club. The club had no female members and did not quite know what to do with one, but, they were inclusive in the way a bunch of guys can be and promptly made me the secretary of the club and started inviting me out diving regularly. Most weeks, I did two dives a week in all male company, at least until I had convinced my best friend to learn to dive and join me. Then the club had two female members.

After scuba diving came bushwalking and canyoning - there was a scattering of women but most trips were heavily male dominated. Then came mountaineering, rock climbing, ski mountaineering, alpine climbing, long ski traverses, and male partners, lots and lots and lots of male partners. Trips with guys are not like trips with women, you have to earn male respect. These guys all had wives and girlfriends, who would only come on the easiest trips. When I proved that I could ski, climb, carry a big pack, and do all the things that they did, they were appropriately inclusive. Most of the time, judging by the conversation, they forgot I was even female.

I had my pink period when I tried to garner around me a female peer group, women I could ski and climb with at the same level as I did with my male partners. At that time I had one or two solid female partners, but not in all aspects. One of my friends was a strong rock climber (at least on bolts) but she did not climb trad, did not climb in the mountains, and was a weak back-country skier. Another friend was a strong, and more importantly keen, backcountry skier and scrambler, but she did not lead climb and was only available for day trips.

During the pink period I joined a female climbing team at the rock climbing gym in town and started running female backcountry ski trips for my local club. Indoors, the other women kicked my butt. I was struggling on 5.9's and 10's while they were cruising 10d's, but outside, it was another story. The women, if they turned up at all, were timid, and I found myself doing the majority of the leading, route setting, trail breaking and decision making. I never really fit in and I never got over the feeling that the women were climbing and skiing because climbing and skiing - at that time and in that town - was cool. When they started talking about buying matching climbing clothes, I realised my pink period was over.

Sadly, most of my female friends from that era, certainly the ones from the climbing team, no longer climb or ski. The truth is, they weren't really that into outdoor sports. A few months ago my nephew wanted me to teach him to rock climb. I am not sure what brought this new interest on, I suspect the movie "Free Solo". We climbed together three times and now, less than six months later, as far as I can tell, he has all but given up rock climbing. Not because of his gender, but simply because he is just not that into outdoor sports. No amount of inclusivity will change that.

Althorpe, Seal and Haystack Islands by Sea Kayak

About ten kilometres off the coast of Cape Spencer at the southern tip of the Yorke Peninsula there are several spaced islands. The largest of these, at 96 hectares, is Althorpe Island. To the northeast, five or six kilometres away, are two other islands, Haystack and Seal Islands. Seal Island is actually not one, but two islands with a narrow passage between granite slabs.

On a sunny calm day we launched the kayaks from Cable Hut Bay for a circuit of all these islands. Cable Hut Bay is the nearest accessible launch site and lies just to the east of Cape Spencer. The distance out to Althorpe Island is about 12 kilometres and the tidal current through Investigator Strait is charted as running at up to 1.5 knots. Accordingly, we started by aiming off Althorpe Island, but later, after noticing only minimal drift, we dispensed with that.

Paddling out, Althorpe Island got slowly closer. We did pass through a section of tidal rapids but with no wind, there was no real hazard. Drawing into the very small beach on the northeastern side of the island we noticed a couple of Australian Sea Lions resting on-shore.

Of course, if you come upon a small island in a big sea in a kayak you must paddle around it, so we headed east around the southern side of the island. On the southern side, the currents are strong and with clapotis and rebound it was a very bumpy few kilometres until we got around to the more sheltered northwestern side of the island. There are a few small scattered rocky islets and some deep clefts and valleys carved into the island by the incessant pulse of the sea. We explored all these before returning to the northeastern beach.

Next stop was Seal Island, five kilometres to the northwest. We paddled across to the passage and past a couple of low lying granite islets home to many sea birds but no seals.

Only a couple of kilometres to the northwest is Haystack Island which, unlike Seal Island, is limestone. The island does bear some resemblance to a Haystack. Paddling around Haystack was really interesting as the island has a couple of limestone ledges in tiers up its height. The lowest tier belongs to Sea Lions, which were resting on rocks, swimming beside the island or even resting deep in caves. The upper tier is home to various sea birds, almost every space along the upper tier being occupied as we paddled past. On the northern end of the island we found a very large cave home to more sea birds and seals. This cave went right through the island.

Back to Cable Hut Bay and a much needed leg stretch after another stunning South Australia paddle.

First Look

My good friend, Robin aka Captain Bivouac, recently emailed me from Canada asking for the latest Covid lockdown news.  Robin is probably the most eccentric of my cast of fairly outre friends which, of course, makes him an absolute delight to be around . As I have frequently noted, the trouble with normal is it always gets worse and personally I try to my best to spend as little time as possible in the world of normal.

Robin appreciates a conspiracy as much as I do and has, in fact, visited the old Royal Hotel in Nelson, BC, where the Conspiracy Times originated.  Robin's son, Wolf, an eccentric character in his own right, even runs an online magazine with a mandate of promoting original thought.  

Hi Robin:

Here is the Australia report.

About a month ago we got back from a big sea kayaking trip off South Australia. It was like the old fact finding expeditions we used to mount in the West Kootenays, heading off into places unknown except instead of recording the condition of logging roads, trails and mountain routes and glaciers we were documenting launch sites, camp sites, currents, tides, islands and paddle routes.

It was magnificent; 500 kilometres in the Southern Ocean. Big seas, strong winds, biting salt spray, surf launches and landings, Sea Lions and dolphins, rolling swells, diving gulls and the unremitting South Australian sun. Apparently, we are only the fourth or fifth party to ever circumnavigate Thistle Island in a sea kayak which is mostly shocking because, although it is exposed to full force of the Southern Ocean, it is not - in the scheme of things - that hard. Mostly, it backs up my thesis that the population is getting more and more risk averse, even the youth don't seem to have the appetite for big adventures any more.

Which is the perfect segue into a Covid update as, despite the low risk of catching Covid in Australia and the low mortality rate, the dominant narrative reeks of panic. Plenty of material there for the contrarian thinker, just don't say any of it out loud as you will get twisted looks implying you're a nut-job and should be locked up for the good of society.

Prior to leaving we had to get "travel permits" to pass through Victoria - which we travelled through without stopping - and South Australia. Luckily, at the time we left, all of Australia was a "green zone" so our permits were issued automatically. As a conspiracy theorist and anarchist at heart, having the government know my movements was not particularly comfortable. However, we passed through all state borders without getting stopped despite having our documentation with us at all times.

Although we both have mobile telephones, neither of us have downloaded any of the "Covid Safe" apps, because really, if a mobile telephone kept you safe from Covid there would be very little Covid. In Australia, the federal government launched the first Covid Safe app which was rapidly labelled a $2 million failure after not assisting in the tracking of a single person exposed to Covid. That later rose to $9 million when it was revealed that a further $7 million had been spent on advertising. Clearly, throwing a few "Instafluencers" a few bucks to stand on a cliff top doing a yoga pose in a bikini would have been both more effective and cheaper.

This is pretty much the mantra of the LNP Crime Family in Federal Politics, launch some product at great expense to tremendous fan fare and then watch it fall over like a dead horse. Sadly, Scott Morrison, the politician with the most derogatory nicknames who ever led a parliament (Scuntomo, Clotmo, ScottytheFuckwit, Scoalmo, Smirko, to mention only a few), has not fallen yet and is still making announcements.

Anyway, in South Australia, the public, particularly a certain demographic known by the initials BB appeared, at least as far as we observed, to be very diligent about checking in to every store they entered with their mobile telephones held up to scan a QR code. Frankly, I don't know what a QR code is but that does not stop me about being suspicious about having my movements tracked by big government no matter the reason. Besides, I don't install apps on my mobile telephone. Strangely enough, I use it as a telephone, a quaint flashback to an earlier time when people talked to each other instead of staring at small screens.

As a conspiracy theorist and closet anarchist, I am increasingly disturbed by the intrusion of technology into our lives and the degree to which we are tracked, analysed and ultimately manipulated by marketing executives. Interestingly, the meme "the product is you" originated way back in 1973, long before the world wide web was even a theme in a sci-fi novel, when the video "Television delivers people" aired. The artists correctly, as all thinking people now realise, described how the TV viewer pays for the privilege of being sold. Now we are sold via mobile telephones, apps and social media. If I talk about this with anyone in my family they give me that crazy eyed squint and tell me how fantastically convenient it is that Google knows exactly what they want to buy before they have even thought of it themselves.

Nobody seems to mind being turned into consumptive automatons, but, the idea of catching a virus, however remote, conjures up great fear and trepidation. Personally, I am more afraid of the degree to which previously cognizant human beings are turning into lemmings than anything else.

At the start of the Covid era, my niece launched a business as an elopement photographer. Actually, the business started as a wedding planning service but with big weddings out, I guess "elopement" marketing made sense, and so she "pivoted" as the management gurus would say. Following, virtually, along on this journey has exposed me to a side of life I have never seen before, and frankly, hope to never see again. The relevance here is that she markets a concept called a "first look", which is, apparently, a "modern tradition" - although that seems like an oxymoron to any thinking person, but, as we have already established, there are very few of those left standing. Anyway, apparently selling people photographs of a "first look" at someone who they have been looking at every day for several years is really good business.

And that brings me to my final conclusion on the state of affairs in Australia. You can sell anyone anything if you give it a name, except, that is, for the Covid Safe app.

A Higher Standard

There is a truism, the spurner of literally hundreds of self-help books, that success is built upon habits. As a believer in this truism I have organised my life around habits that build my definition of success. Strangely, however, I had never really visualised the converse of this truism: bad habits build failure and yet this is the dominant paradigm in the modern world.

A couple of years ago we met up with some old friends that we had not seen for a long time. Great people, but, with the passage of a few years it had become obvious that neglecting to mindfully build good habits into their lives has resulted in decades of bad habits; which leads me to segue into another truism: nature abhors a vacuum. Either deliberately construct a successful life built upon good habits or find yourself in your latter years, poorer than you would like, with dependent adult children, obese, unhealthy and trapped in the results of decades of bad habits at a time in your life when changing habits is more difficult than ever before.

The reality of building good habits is that we must look beyond first order effects to second and even third order effects. The easiest path, due to our evolutionary biology and the manipulation of the modern world, is to slide inevitably towards first order effects: buying into a materialistic culture, eating hyperpalatable processed food, failing to train hard and move often, spending too much time on screens and too little in the real world. Even more troubling, there appear to be intergenerational effects; epigenetics suggests that both nature and nurture have a role here.

Art DeVany is famously quoted, when asked how to lose body fat, as saying "don't get fat in the first place." And therein lies my final truism, if you want a successful life don't allow yourself an unsuccessful one: hold yourself and your children to a higher standard.

Escaping The Madness Of Crowds: Sir Joseph Banks Group

Easter weekend, and, although we are eight solid hours drive from Adelaide, the Eyre Peninsula is getting busier and busier. Time for two sea kayakers to escape the madness of crowds and head out for an island adventure. We have chosen the Sir Joseph Banks Group of islands located near the southwestern end of Spencer Gulf but well sheltered from ocean swells. For us, this will be the least committing sea kayak we do in South Australia and it feels, appropriately, like we are winding down.

We have decided to leave from Tumby Bay, the usual launch spot for kayakers heading out to the island group. The forecast is, of course, sunny, and winds should be favourable, light northeasterlies for two days followed by light southerly winds. It is about 26 kilometres out to where we plan to camp at a bay on the northern end of Revesby Island, but we can shorten our crossing to 20 kilometres by having a quick break on Tumby Island.

Day 1: Tumby Bay to Revesby Island.

Leaving Tumby Bay, we can just see a small hump of an island in the far distance which lines up with our "rough enough is good enough" compass bearing and we assume this is our destination. Turns out, over a 26 kilometre crossing, "rough enough is good enough" is not quite good enough and the hump we end up heading for is at the far southern end of Revesby Island. Had we looked more carefully at the topographic map before leaving this would have been obvious as, at 33 metres, the trig on the south end of Revesby Island is the highest point in the entire island group. Compared to our other South Australian sea kayaking trips, this one felt so easy and uncomplicated that we got a little lax with navigation, and thus our navigation was a little off.

To shorten the crossing, we stopped at Tumby Island as we headed southeast. Tumby Island is pretty much connected to the mainland, at least at low tide, and a long reef spreads east for about a kilometre so we had to paddle around that to get back on our bearing. There is not much you can say about long crossings except that they are long, and there is nothing much to look at. Eventually, however, like all things, crossings to come to an end.

On the way to our final camp for the night we paddled by Winceby Island where there is a good sized Australian Sea Lion colony. Camped only a couple of kilometres away across Douglas Channel we got to hear the sounds of sea lions at sporadic intervals. They are louder than you might think.

We had a great campsite in a big sheltered bay on the north end of Revesby Island. Up on a sand dune there was good shade and a breeze, all important features in South Australia sea kayaking, and a choice of two beaches, one on either side of a sand isthmus to walk along.

Day 2 Revesby Island to Stickney Island

A lovely, if hot, day of island hopping as we paddled south to camp on the north side of Stickney Island. First down the east side of Revesby Island and then across to Blythe Island, Hareby Island and Roxby Island. Sea lions are everywhere and we also pass occasional pods of dolphins.

By the time we start the 10 kilometre crossing to Stickney Island from Roxby Island, we have both stripped off life jackets and spray decks as it is glassy calm and very hot without a stirring of breeze.

At Stickney Island, we rig our tarp up to give some shade, swim many times, and wait for the afternoon to cool before we walk east around the island on granite slabs and boulders to a big bay on the south side of the island. Stick nest rats live on these islands, as do Cape Barren Geese and osprey. We see evidence of all this wildlife.

Day 3: Stickney Island to Revesby Island

Taking advantage of the cooler morning air we walk around the western half of the island to the big bay before packing up and heading north. This time, we paddle up the western side of the island group, passing Langton Island, Dalby Island and Kirkton Island. We pass a big colony of Sea Lions laying flat out on a beach completely unbothered and uninterested in our presence. There is a buoy off the beach and we realise that this is the where the tour boats bring swimmers to interact with the sea lions.

The next island is Lusby Island and we are very close to Home Bay on Revesby Island. Home Bay is the only place we see other boats in our journey around the islands. There are about 12 boats and yachts anchored in the bay and, as we are on an escape the crowds trip, we avoid Home Bay and have lunch on Lusby Island instead.

Heading north we pass Partney Island and finally around into our previous camp on the northern end of Revesby Island. There is a monstrous power boat anchored off shore, but the inhabitants are not seen nor heard and they head back to the mainland in the late afternoon leaving just the sea kayakers and the sea lions to enjoy another spectacular sunset.

Day 4: Revesby Island to Tumby Bay

We have decided to do better on our return trip to the mainland so we take a careful compass bearing, adjust it for declination, and follow it assiduously back to Tumby Island and on to Tumby Bay. It works very well and the trip back is smooth, aided by a modest tail wind. It turns out that, given the timidity of the average Australian (don't "at" me) escaping the crowds was easy.