This morning we made the easy 28 km trip up the road to Port Fairy.

But first, a pit stop to Bunnings was necessitated to fix a small leak under our sink. Kelly quickly sorted this out with some silicone sealant…whilst I wandered around in the tool-section all tranced out and dreaming of having a well stocked tool shed of my own and the knowledge & skills to be able to work in it (I had pretty much exhausted my mechanical aptitude getting the top off the silicon tube).

Onwards.

Port Fairy was an old whaling town in the early 19th century, now successfully rebirthed into a popular tourist destination.

It has become quite clear during our short travels, how effective injecting a little Arts into a struggling rural town can be in revitalising it’s spirit. Be it fine or applied arts, music, literature, theatre or local crafts, these activities seem to draw in visitors and community.

As we rolled in to town, Fairy was busy unpacking her annual folk festival, a big deal with international acts and thousands of musicians performing in a pop-up village of large tents.

Things were abuzz with food stalls and stages all being set up, sound checks in progress, and plenty of interesting fringe dwellers, folk-centrics and miscellaneous travellers to ‘people-watch’ over good coffee.

We toyed with the idea of staying here overnight but accomodation prices had been jacked up during the festival, so after a thoroughly enjoyable amble around the streets, we hit the road.

Our first planned freecamping destination for the evening turned out to be a little shabby, so we drove on to ‘plan B’, a free overnight campground for self contained vehicles just outside of Dartmoor.

This is a brilliant spot.

A large grassy clearing beside the Glenelg river with toilets and plenty of shady trees.

Whilst out for a walk we met David, a local who had decided to settle down here after retiring and travelling around Australia with his wife for 14 years in a large caravan. We spent some time chatting across his gate as crickets sang in the late afternoon sun.

In fact, it is so beautiful & relaxing here that we have decided to stay on for a second night.