On my morning walk I discovered two tracks that we hadn’t been on so I did a small recce of these and determined after our difficult day yesterday we would stay relatively closer to mother earth, still covering the minimum 20kms.

The outside route to St Mary’s looked interesting and should take our focus off our backaches. On the way we met a delightful young couple who had just completed their mountain walk so we swapped notes about our climbs and other things. They were there for the day only so wanted to get as much out of the day as possible. 

He mentioned his dad who is an iron/steel sculptor, which required a lot of noise, and in days gone past this was acceptable but not today so he has had to stop. When we parted and had covered some distance, I thought more of his dad’s sculpting. We passed sculptures that required no daily noise, and would never receive complaints.

We had just reached one of these sculptures, like an exotic garden amongst the colourful rocks. There were large grey sculpted rocks, pretty shaped grass trees with rain drops dangling from their reedy fronds, standing amongst scattered colourful stones, amid a mixture of varied green shrubs on red soil. And there were many of these, all with the glow that only rain can bring. 

Then there were these rolling, twisting hills and valleys that formed our crooked path, sculptures in themselves, leading us on to further beauties. On our right was a native pine forest intimidating with its burnt trunks, but cosy when it rained, and it did. On our left were the orange mountains of the Flinders, imposing, beautiful.

It took me back to our previous walks which of course are all great works of art. The hidden gorges, ensuring that you worked hard to find them; mountain paths, some which seemed to be deterring our advance; then the gums and the grass trees that delight us every day; all of which excite us with their presence.

After yesterday we needed longer and more breaks, so after lunch we went for a drive to plan our departure in three days. We saw the walks I had researched as we passed their signs on the roadside and new trails that had escaped me in my research (especially another mountain climb with the word spectacular in it. Sounds like a sculpture we would love to see.

Back home, still with little light left in the day, I ventured out on to the Heysen trail, which we had crossed and walked on multiple times before. The sign said that this was for experienced walkers only and “advised” against taking it. So, confident but wary, I was comforted by the mountain’s snugness to me, I knew the trail symbols, and I wasn’t going far. 

There was an eerie stillness as I walked. And then it happened. Those very dark clouds opened up with blueberry-size hailstones, large enough to sting my arms. It seemed forever before it stopped but it wasn’t and it didn’t. Quiet again, then another hail storm. Very quiet once more and then a third burst. I reflected on that earlier sign – I was advised.