Day 519 | Hill past Kapunda Rifle Range: but not in the firing line

61 km | zzOz total: 16,819 km

Another strange parallel with my previous Mawson Trail voyage: I broke a chain link grinding up Gants Hill Road. It all looked familiar but later on, almost to Kapunda, I realised it was another hill my chain had pinged.

Despite my minimal progress each day the Trail is more compact than I recalled, maybe the first time you do something it all seems completely stretched out, but to be fair to the route, particularly today, the Mawson is a rollercoaster. Despite this 80 or even 90 km would be a more reasonable effort for someone more assiduous in making tracks, ie, travelling with a 15 day time frame for the entire trail.

I’ve already said one feature of the Trail is the use of an up and down dirt route when there is an almost parallel, flatter, sealed alternative just following down at the bottom of the valley.

Another feature is the circumlocutory, I’m tempted to add the adjective bizarre there, as exemplified by the trajectory into Kapunda.

You come down a terrific back road, all up and down following the ascent of Gants Hill, onto the sealed Clare to Kapunda road for a k or two, passing The Pines rest area where I camped 3 years ago, but rather than following that splendid, and short, direct entry to Kapunda, turn off onto a real oscillating track, at times just following a fenceline through a paddock, gate opening and closing required, one mighty effort up a rise needed, contact feet to ground necessary, but the pay off is an enormous view over the hinterland that few would get to appreciate ain’t much in the way of vehicular traffic up there, right over to the hills on the other side of the Barossa Valley, except those that seem to be another crop, broad beans nearing harvest, turning black to interrupt the otherwise golden vista.

Over the left shoulder in the distance, ie, you have progressed way beyond, are the silos and vegetation of the hilly Kapunda, it’s one of the great views of the southern part of the Trail, a ridiculous detour for those intent on an A to B direct style travel.

The Mawson does the A to B, it’s just that it encompasses C, D, E, F with those expansive views of G and H thrown in for the same effort, it’s particularly well suited for those meandering travellers such as myself.