Up the Creek with a paddle...

The final activity in our action adventure package deal was kayaking, so that’s what we had arranged for this morning. This involved another drive to Vivonne Bay. As we got there a few minutes early, we drove out to the Vivonne Bay jetty to check out the view.

Once we were kitted up with all the gear we launched the kayaks into the Harriet River. We then had up to four hours to paddle upstream and back.

Our first goal was to meander to the road bridge and paddle under it. From there, we were told there is almost guaranteed sightings of koalas to be had.

The trees were not too big and before we knew it, we’d spotted a couple of the docile balls of fur. Photos were tricky as we only had our phones with us – in zip lock bags, whipping them out for the occasional photo, paranoid about dropping them overboard!

We paddled back to the beach where we got the esky out of the car and ate lunch. The kids then enjoyed another paddle just in the area near our launching spot.

We dropped off the equipment and then drove back down to Vivonne Beach. Our goal was to walk about 1 km along the beach to retrieve a geocache. It was a lovely walk, with more dramatic cloud out to sea, adding to the colours of the scenery. Rounding one rocky cape we spotted a large hive of bees and their honeycomb. If you could harvest that honey I’m sure it would have a salty flavour being so close to the blustery Southern Ocean!

We found the cache. An interesting one wrapped up in canvas, a home made wooden box with the story of Captain Baudin and his exploration of this area. The log book pointed out the change in our world... by finding this cache we had utilised far superior technology (GPS and satellite navigation) compared to those early explorers who largely navigated with a compass and the moon!

On the way back towards the car park we climbed to what looked like a new lookout for some photos.

We called in at Kingscote on the way home for a bit of shopping. Picked up some essential supplies as well as a couple of treats and souvenirs.

We drove back to American River and enjoyed a relaxing wine on the verandah, taking in the serenity. Other than the birds, there is absolutely no noise in the area… well except for the kids of course!

Our time on KI is rapidly coming to a close and tomorrow will be our last full day. We still have a couple of places we want to check out before packing up and moving out. Stay tuned.