Banana Dramas

March 25, 2024

McLarenvale Flat & Willunga

Back when I started this little adventure I bought two bananas and on the first day I ate one. On the second day I looked for my banana and couldn't find it. After a little search I gave up, thinking that I had a) eaten it too and not remembered doing so or b) left it behind somehow. The banana, forgotten, lurked in the side pocket of my pannier through many bumps and bashes and seven days of hot sunshine.

In the bright McLaren Vale morning I unzipped the side pocket of my pannier and stuck my hand in, confidently reaching for my hand cream and meeting instead a liquefied banana which had, until I poked it, been precariously contained within its black and fragile skin. When all the squawking and flapping of hands and desperate seeking for water and paper towels was over I had a considerably cleaner pannier, a considerably cleaner rain jacket (which had been snuggled up to the banana during the process of decomposition), and paranoia related to stepping on a random piece of post-banana sludge which I may have overlooked during the clean up process.

Banana dramas aside, I had a lovely time on this my last riding day. The weather, albeit a bit chilly in the early morning, was perfect for riding. My unloaded bike felt exceptionally nimble when relieved of heavy panniers. I followed a side leg of the Coast to Vines trail out to McLaren Flat, looping around the caravan park where my tent was tucked in among the trees.

I took a quick loop around the not-very-wet wetlands in McLaren Flat, and went uptown for a look. There wasn't a lot to see, just a pub that doubled as a grocery store, a small school, and a collection of houses the inhabitants of whom must spend all day somewhere else. I turned around and enjoyed the little roads and birdsong all the way back to McLaren Vale where I hung a left and followed the Coast to Vines to its official terminus in Willunga.

The morning was busy on the Coast to Vines Trail. Peletons of geriatric cyclists, dressed in bright colours and riding electric bikes, zoomed past me with various degrees of "Good Morning!" Serious Cyclists, head down and bum up, didn't deign to acknowledge lesser mortals such as me, as I chugged up the hills and coasted on the downhills. Walkers with dogs and teenagers on skateboards kept everyone on their toes.

Railway machinery? It was at the old Willunga Railway Station, which was rather neglected given it is the trail head for the Coast to Vines trail.

I stopped at the rose garden maze and made it all the way to the centre without crossing under an archway. Yay for me.

Emboldened by my amazing (ha!) success, I went for a little walk up the main street of Willunga which coincidentally ended at the bottom of the Willunga Hill up which the Serious Cyclists set off with intensity and purpose. Not me though, I didn't have that much purpose in me so I drank my coffee and mentally prepared for the onerous 8km downhill ride back to camp.

Hills of the Fleureiu Peninsula on the other side of the valley.

Back at camp the park had established an inadvertent water feature which provided a lot of entertainment: park management ran in frantic circles; park maintenance men practicing blame-shifting; campers who happened to be plumbers circled with professional interest; and everyone else rushed to use the toilet and fill up their kettles before the water went off.

While I was away I had gained a neighbour. Mary* arrived in a taxi after her rented caravan was delivered to the site next to me. She told a sad tale of losing her rental accommodation and moving to the caravan, subsequently being 'encouraged' to move out of the big-city parks to make space for the holiday crowd paying holiday prices. Together Mary and I worked out how to pop up the top of her caravan and secure her awning, settling her in for the night.

Barely had I said goodbye to Mary than I met Mr and Mrs, also part of the flotsam and jetsam of caravan-nomads sloshing around between caravan parks while working out what to do next. They had strong views on everything: politics, religon, the youth of today, the raising of children in tune with nature and without chemicals, and no doubt the prevention of cruelty toward bananas. Eventually I pleaded hunger and left to make my dinner which, being all neighboured out, I ate in hiding.

As the sun set skeins of corellas and cockatoos spooled across the sky, providing a sound track to the evening. The water came back on in time for sweaty cyclists like me to have evening showers.

The last job of the day was to put in place my banana management plan, the aim of which was to never again have a unacknowledged banana demise under my watch. Accordingly I ate my last banana for dessert and went to bed secure in the knowledge that there would be no banana-related dramas in the morning.

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