Up about 200km from Adelaide into the the Flinders Ranges and Wilpena Pound. These are the largest mountain ranges in South Australia and it was like entering a timeless arena.

Once into the flatter ground within the walls of the Pound I could feel time slowing, or rather becoming an abstract as I walked. I nearly always travel alone, though I haven’t rally thought about it and didn’t then and that was a long time ago 1st May 1989. Solitude.

It was on the way back, coming over the lip that I came across Yellow-footed Rock Wallaby grazing. They certainly knew I was there, but didn’t seem troubled and calmly went about their business.

My journey on was to the Barrossa Valley, to stay with the Hardy’s vineyard manager - and yes, I was looking forward to that!

I did an acrylic painting of the wallaby later, when back in the UK.

Not all BNG is created/managed equally.

Farmers - this is NOT the approach 😡

Withens. Didn't get much adult time to enjoy the place, but home is where the heart is.

I loved growing-up there, running wild in the Derbyshire countryside and building my model aircraft in an old chicken hut my Dad bought in an effort to keep me slightly grounded and out of trouble. It was an improvement on the bars on my bedroom windows 👍

Still, I was packed away to boarding school in Cumbria for a lot of the time - bot that that was a bad thing in itself - it's just I missed my friends and that shed full of balsa shavings and the smell of cellulose dope.

It's been a while - 1987(?)

Following a work placement at the Freshwater Biological Association on the edge of Lake Windermere, I went out to Woods Hole to spent some time with a friend who went out to work there.

Really enjoyed the relaxed pace of Cape Cod and out on Martha’s Vineyard, but there had been a storm and a lot of the coastal road had been ripped up, though we managed to buy Ulrike a car for her time there, She’s now settled as a Professor at Salzburg University, which is a little closer.