7^th December (Wednesday) Lakes Entrance, Victoria to Eden, NSW

I was expecting the drive up to Eden to be relatively flat with fairly constant views of the Tasman Sea but I couldn’t have been more wrong. The route appeared to take us closer to the Snowy Mountain terrain than I had imagined with hills, forests and windy roads and a multitude of creeks with a wide range of names: wombat, dinner, hospital (no hospital in sight), stony,  etc etc.. One also passes over the Snowy Mountain River and through a fair number of national parks on the journey. The quality of the roads is good, and for a population only 24 million it makes me wonder how high the taxes must be to provide the infrastructure funds.

Route from Lakes Entrance to Mallacoota

We stopped off at the Bellbird Hotel for a morning coffee, which was not much bigger than a shack. We were the only customers but the barman was clearly expecting a deluge as the Christmas holiday period started, so much so that cars travelling on the opposite side of the road going north avoid stopping since it takes so long to get back across the road.

We decided to take a detour to Mallacoota on the coast and this town turned out to be a real gem. 

Mallacoota Estuary

The town is on the shore of a huge estuary that is fed by a very narrow and shallow channel (<1m) from the ocean. A few mobile homes and campers were present and we were assured that it would be exceedingly busy in a week or two’s time as Christmas approached.

Hi-tech mobile home in Mallacoota

The whole place is laid out exceedingly tastefully with mobile home and campers getting a great location right on the waterfront with a full range of facilities. It is also an ideal place for canoeing and fishing. A fisherman on the bank had spotted a 1m wide stingray right up against the bank just before we arrived.

Fishermen in Mallacoota heading back from the sand spit

After a snack for lunch we headed off to Eden to find our accommodation for the next two nights, which was at Eagle Heights in Eden overlooking the Tasman Sea.

We bought a few provisions in the town and I also found a mobile phone repair shop, which I will aim to visit tomorrow after or before golf. The Telstra SIM card that I picked up in Darwin is only giving me data provision and no voice calls. I tried to resolve the problem in Melbourne but thought it was only a temporary glitch, since it started to function correctly, but this is certainly not the case now.  I can still use WhatsApp for making calls but clearly cannot receive normal phone calls.

For our evening meal we were advised to order fish and chips from “Hooked on Seafood” at the Wharf.  We were advised that the best fish to purchase was “Flake”. The name 'flake' refers to gummy shark. It was certainly very wholesome and soft compared to shark that I have eaten in the past.