Day 210 Ceduna, SA

 Philip reckons that we are bad weather magnets.  I'm beginning to think that he is right.  After I finished yesterdays blog post the weather turned extremely bad.  We had wind gusts up to 90kmh but surprisingly not much rain.  We folded in the awning and brought in the slide-out before we went to bed so that we might rest easy.  The BOM was sending out severe weather warnings every hour so we definitely sat up and took notice.  Thankfully the wind eased throughout the night and we woke to a calm day.  But not for long though as we were once again issued notices that the severe winds were returning in the afternoon and would last into the night.  

Before the wild weather returned, and it was still relatively calm, we decided to get in the car and go exploring the Ceduna area.  First stop was Pinky Point Lookout where there are many grain silos and a huge mound of gypsum all ready for export.  Indeed, there is a ship being loaded with grain as we watched.

Back in the car and out of the rain we headed towards Denial Bay where are, what remains, of the old Mackenzie Homestead and township.  I love old ruins and imagine myself living in that era.  It must have been very difficult.  These old buildings were made from whatever they could find in the area and in this area it is sand and rocks. 

It is said that William McKenzie (1844-1906) could seat 50 people in this dining room and his home was the "social hub" of the Denial Bay Area.  He was a man of many talents.  Farmer, Blacksmith, Builder, Harbour Master and JP, and was known for the slogan "You can't grow wheat with hands in your pocket".  We were intrigued with the remains of the round tanks that were very deep.  Salt water from the ocean was piped into these tanks and the water was then condensed and used for stock water.

We continued our journey and arrived into the little town of Denial Bay.  The first buildings we come across are very large sheds with lots of oyster trays stacked around the buildings.  We drove into one shed that said "Fresh Oysters for Sale" but sadly there was no-one there to sell us any oysters.

In Denial Bay we stopped at the jetty and even though the wind was almost blowing us backwards, we just HAD to walk the length of it.  You may have guessed by now that Philip (and me to some extent) is a jetty lover.  If he sees a jetty he just HAS to walk the length of it and boy, haven't we walked a few of these jetties over the past seven months.  

Before the Jetty was built in 1909 there was a landing to the north of the jetty.  It was from this landing that produce and people were loaded at low tide.  You can just pick out the landing in the photo below.

It was the quickest walk ever to the end of a jetty because the rain was coming towards us at a rapid rate and we only just made it back to the car before it tumbled down.  We decided that it was time to head home as it was almost lunch and the severe wind was due to hit us again within the hour.  

It is now 3pm and the wind is starting to really pick up.  We are heading to Streaky Bay tomorrow and will spend three nights there because Wikicamps tells us that there are some pretty amazing tourist drives in the area.