A Life Behind Barmera

Day: 355

Towns / Cities Visited: 257

Countries Visited: 31

Steps Taken Today: 10,480

Steps Taken Around the World: 5,577,277

The time had come to move on from Adelaide, but we rolled out of bed with very little desire to pack down the tent. It had been a windy night, and the flapping of the tent had woken me more than once, its sound stoking a fear in my heart something akin to PTSD after the events in Port Elliot. Despite my desire to fall back to sleep, I had been stuck with my ears trained on the sounds around me, expecting to hear my sewing rip again or another tent pole crumple at any moment. Of course, the wind was barely a fifth of the strength we had faced, but my anxiety lingered, nonetheless. The result? A weary and worn-out camper dismantling a tent with unwilling hands.

Bidding farewell to the comfortable, mesh covered site we had called home for the past five nights, we hit the road, making a quick stop to grab some groceries on the way out of town. As we headed inland, we passed by the endless expanses of vineyards and watched as the scenery around us began to change.

The sandy soils of the coast gave way to the kind of rich red earth that Australia is known for, and the singular trunks of tall eucalypts yielded to the shorter, more sprawling, multi-trunked mallees. Eventually, the vineyards began to share space with fruit laden citrus orchards and we met up with the Murray River. We found ourselves…