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The next part of our holiday could easily be describes as pure luxury. It involved spending 3 nights on a 10-12 berth houseboat and floating down the Murray River. We picked the boat up from Mannum, a large town along the Murray River. The houseboat was aptly called 'Cloud 9' and it was a piece of heaven. The interior was modern and extremely comfortable with the biggest TV I have ever seen. We quickly made ourselves at home, picking out our rooms and dumping our luggage. We then had the owner and operators come on board to give us a run-through of all the boats facilities and a demonstration as to how to drive the boat. It seemed all fairly simple and before long we were all on our way.
It all seemed fairly simple but in fact it was far from. Driving the boat didn't mean putting the steering wheel straight and that's the way we go - o no, that's not how it works at all. It involved constant correction and we recon we must have travelled twice as far as we actually got due to the constant zigzagging we all achieved. But that night we parked up along the river bank and had a relaxing diner and a short moonlight dip in the hot tub on the top deck - yes a hot tub!!! It was fantastic.
The whole trip was lovely - we played lots of games as a family, watched a few films, and went for walks along the riverbank where we could find them (it's a bit ironic really; we want to go walking, so we hire a boat). There was also a canoe on board so most of us took the chance to go paddling up and down the river and see some of the wildlife that included parrots, pelicans and I saw an eagle. Uncle had brought a couple of fishing rods with him. There were plenty of fish in the river, we could see them jumping everywhere but would any come near our rods - not a chance. Then again, the fish were mainly carp, not good eating. Carp in Australia are seen like rabbits, foxes and feral cats - all introduced species that have caused havoc in native habitats. It is therefore law that if a carp is caught it must be killed and fed to the pelicans. Megan and Colleen did however manage to catch a number of shrimp which we battered and ate - yum.
Mooring the boat was by far the most difficult bit of the entire driving procedure. All but once we managed to moor the boat perfectly. On the second day it was particularly windy and as we attempted to moor, the wind picked up the back of the boat and swung it round into a tree - not good. We ended up with a nasty but small hole in the fibreglass body of the boat. It took us a fair while to get off even with the help of another boat. We eventually managed it with a bit of pulling and pushing and quickly decided a spot with no trees to smash into would be better. We weren't the only boats to find our self in a sticky position; we found the boat that had attempted to rescue us stranded on the bank the next morning and according to the owner there have been boats that have come back with entire awnings ripped off and trees that have smashed straight through the boat from one side to the other. So we felt a little better about it. It didn't dampen our spirits though and we had a wonderfully relaxing time watching the world float by along with the Murray Princess - a huge paddle boat steamer.
On the way home from the Murray we drove through the Barossa Valley, a huge wine making region. Its landscape is quite different to what the rest of the area surrounding Adelaide is like, lots of hills and green with all the vines growing in rows upon rows. We then climbed Mt Lofty the highest mountain in the region (but still not very big) with a memorial on top dating its discovery. The thing that amazed me most is that my house back home was built before it was even discovered! The view over Adelaide was beautiful though. A perfect way to spend Christmas Eve.
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