We escape to Kangaroo Island

This is not a rote list of places to stay and things to do, more about the atmosphere, the people and in the immortal words of Dennis Denuto in The Castle: “the vibe”. Subaru has joined us for the journey, providing a Forester 2.0D-L. It turned out to be the right choice as we ventured onto some roads less travelled.

Getting there isn’t easy
In an era where we take international travel for granted, getting to Kangaroo Island, just a couple of hours from Adelaide and 16km from the Australian mainland, probably requires more planning than a flight to London.

This is Australia’s third largest island, behind Tasmania and Melville Island, and to get there, most people will travel aboard the SeaLink car ferry.

Sure you can fly, but it’s very expensive and visitors will need a rental car to get around on the island – commendably the choice includes Nissan Leaf electric and Mitsubishi Outlander PHV. Public transport? Not on Kangaroo Island.

So back to the ferry. And here’s where the planning comes in. There are five to eight crossings per day, depending on the time of year, departing from Cape Jervis, two hours by road south of Adelaide. And folks, you aren’t going to be able to just rock up and get on-board.

This can be a very busy service, so book ahead. The only exception is Christmas Day. Everyone is at home tucking into their pudding on December 25…so no ferries.

Imagine the trains not running in Sydney or Melbourne because Santa is in town? It’s odd, but in a good way.

Certainly Kangaroo Island’s 4500 or so permanent residents seem happy to feel a lot further separated from the mainland than a 45-minute ferry ride might suggest.

“For some people it might seem isolated and for some people it might seem slow and quiet but that’s what I love about it,” says second generation Kangaroo Island farmer Des Pratt, whose parents moved from the Mallala district on the mainland in 1954 as part of the soldier-settlement resettlement after World War II

“It is isolated, we don’t have heaps of people here. We know most people, or at least know of most people who live here, he added”.

To meet Des, we’d wound our way down a beautiful little valley track just a kilometre or two from Kangaroo Island’s northern coast near Stokes Bay. At the time, shearing was in full flow with luxuriantly coated Merino sheep clattering into one end of the shed and bony, bloodied creatures skittering out the other.

Parked across from the shed were the cars of itinerant shearers; VT-VZ generation Holden Commodores one and all. There was even an Adventra, the short-lived, high-rise, all-wheel drive Commodore wagon. In 20 years will they all be driving Kia Stingers?

Des is 62 and he’s lived here all his life, apart from one year of high school in Adelaide. He and his wife Elaine have travelled all around the world but they’re always glad to get home.

“It is the best place possible to live in I believe. It’s just the best place to bring up children,” says the father of four. “It is safe. I don’t know if I should even say this, but we don’t lock our home.”

That sense of security expresses itself in many ways. There are no rabbits or foxes on the island, native fauna and flora reproduce and sprout far more strongly, abundantly and safely than on the mainland.

A vibrant hub
In the township Kingscote, King Island’s commercial hub, we notice a far more upbeat flavour than many small Australian country towns.

While many of the West Australia’s FiFo mining towns are looking decayed, barely functioning and devoid of energy, Kingscote, like a castle protected from marauders by a moat, is saved from the ravages of modern economic imperatives. It bustles industriously and buoyantly like a lot of country towns once did. People stop and greet each other; mothers with kids, young blokes with baseball caps and tatts, old blokes wearing battered Akubras, lifelines written on their faces.

“We have a great community,” says Des. “If any of us are in trouble other people come in and provide support.”

We can understand Des’ passion for the place in which he lives. The northern coastline of Kangaroo Island is one of the most beautiful places you could ever hope to visit.

Beautiful beaches, stunning cliffs, valleys which plunge down through groves of Eucalypts and – the locals assure us – the mildest climate in a place where the weather can get pretty wild.

The curious thing is the north is the least-visited part of the island. To understand why requires a study of the map.

Kangaroo Island doesn’t look like Kangaroo. Sure, numbers of the world’s largest marsupial are overflowing on the island, but its shape on a map is more like a turtle swimming east.

The big tourism attractions are in the south and the south-west. We’re talking Seal Bay, Remarkable Rocks, Admirals Arch, the Flinders Chase National Park and, for those with deep pockets, the spectacular and luxurious Southern Ocean Lodge at Hanson Bay.

So, when the tourist buses roll from the ferry when it docks in the township of Penneshaw, they head south which means the road is sealed and in good condition. Heading west and north, the road surface quickly changes to dirt.

But don’t be deterred. It’s worth raising a little dust in your KI travels. For a start, you should make the effort to get all the way across from Kingscote to the Cape Borda lighthouse. Except for the final 30km, the route is mostly on sealed roads.

Built in 1858, this squat, whitewashed building looks imperturbably out over a seascape repainted every few seconds by wind, cloud and ocean swells.

On our visit, conditions are calm, but Ranger Mick Rosewarne tells us of massive thunderstorms, 18 metre swells with crumbling peaks tumbling into the rocks, of sharks throw themselves on to those same rocks hunting seals, of whales slapping their flukes on the water, massive schools of tuna and salmon and all sorts of birds wheeling, diving and circling.

But he doesn’t see many other people. On an isolated island, he is one of the most solitary of souls, living out here alone.

“I have never understood lonely,” says Mick. “I don’t get lonely. I lived in Adelaide for most of my life and didn’t know my neighbours, so what do you mean lonely?

“That’s the most common question I get from people; ‘don’t you get lonely?’ I say ‘Why, have you got a sister or a mother you want to get rid of?’.

“No I don’t get lonely. I have things that I occupy myself with and I am quite happy to be on my own.”

We told him of our plan to go north and he was enthusiastic.

“North Coast Road is completely under-rated … It’s a stunning drive that no-one does because they all drive around the south coast”, he revealed.

Within the hour we can see what Mick’s talking about. The red gravel spirals and corkscrews down to small, perfect coves then the route winds back up and out again onto headlands surrounded by green pastures.

Subaru Forester in its element
There’s little traffic on North Coast Road. Most people we pass are locals, we know that because they give us the KI – it’s KI to the locals – single digit wave, the hand never leaving the steering wheel.

Our Subaru Forester is in its element here. Subaru’s insistence on all-wheel drive for all its models (bar the BRZ of course) certainly has marketing motivations, but on this road, with its loose surfaces and off-camber bends, it unquestionably adds reassurance.

The Forester’s tall, soft and compliant suspension set-up sooths the rougher surfaces - such as braking ruts - in a way some more on-road oriented rivals simply can’t. It also has a touch more ground clearance and shorter overhangs so it can clear rockier protrusions on minor tracks.

While a CVT automatic transmission and a 108kW/350Nm 2.0-litre turbo-diesel boxer four-cylinder engine is, on paper, a somewhat unsexy combination, in practice they gel together and provide solid, earnest acceleration. Comfortable, economic progress is guaranteed.

Engage ‘X-Mode’ and the Forester becomes more off-road oriented than its rivals can manage. Throttle response is dulled, keeping the transmission in a lower gear setting, front-to-rear coupling of the all-wheel drive system is evened-up, stability control response is fine-tuned and Hill Descent Control is engaged.

Where that adds a little extra security on Kangaroo Island is a place like Emu Bay where beach driving is allowed. Having said that, it offers smooth and hard packed surfaces, so the challenge is minimal.

Emu is a beautiful spot but Snelling Beach is something special, as if created straight from a picture postcard. A small point break wraps around the eastern corner, a creek runs into the sea halting the progress of achingly white sand, green pastures nestle in behind the dunes and a gravel road flows down into the bay from both north and south. It’s a glorious scene.

We go on through Stokes Bay and its black rock beach, stopping for a coffee at the Rockpool Café. It’s a local seafood legend.

Another KI legend
Then we meet another Kangaroo Island legend: Pensioner George Turner and his castle of 52,000 Lights. This is a labour of love if ever there was one. George has painstakingly constructed a timber castle on the property around his family home on the slopes above Smith Bay and strung coloured lights, well, everywhere.

There are walkways, ladders and lookouts and the most amazing and ingenious displays including a Viking ship made of two aluminium dinghies with car hubcaps for shields. The Vikings themselves are made of Buddha heads wearing horned helmets.

There’s also a jumping dolphin and shark made of scrap. Switch on the power and the whole thing rattles into lunging life.

“The shark comes out and he is going to eat the dolphin, but he’s too smart and gets away. In the middle I’ve got gingerbread men waving to the kids,” George explains.

There’s sonar buoy casings repurposed as garden decorations, bedheads as fencing, plastic swords and, appropriately incongruously, model trains. It’s all as inspired and chaotic as it sounds. George is a 74-year old who has clearly tapped into his inner child.

It’s all free for you to wander about. George doesn’t charge entry and neither does he guarantee your safety. He’s poured thousands of dollars into this project and has plans to spend thousands more. Wife Coral just shrugs.

“I started a little hobby and it just grew and grew and got to this stage,” he laughs.

Could George have built his paradise on the mainland? It’s difficult to imagine. Here on Kangaroo Island, his dream is nurtured and protected, just like the rare native vegetation or marsupials which thrive thanks to the isolation.

Progress? Maybe not
Not that Kangaroo Island is without challenges. Population growth and increased tourism will boost the economy, but there are concerns over fresh water stocks. A new multi-user wharf is proposed for Smith Bay so dormant timber plantations can be harvested and exported, a new golf resort is planned for the Dudley Peninsula (the turtle’s head) and the airport runway is being extended to allow direct flights from east coast capitals.

Some people welcome ‘progress’ and others oppose it. Some try to find the middle ground. The future for Kangaroo Island, as for all of us, isn’t pre-determined or guaranteed.

Not long after we leave George’s fantastical empire, the dirt road ends and the bitumen returns. It’s as if we have also returned from an alternative universe, at times startlingly beautiful and then just plain startling.

There are many places we haven’t explored on Kangaroo Island on this trip, but time is running out and the ferry booking has been made.

Knowing there’s much more to be seen, is just an incentive to make the journey back across the sea again some time.

Kangaroo Island facts
Size: 4405km2 with 509km of coastline, making it Australia’s third largest island
Length: 155km east-west
Width: 55km north-south at its widest point
Population: 4417 (2011 Census)
Average min-max temps: 10-21 (Spring); 15-27 (Summer); 12-22 (Autumn); 7-15 (Winter)

Getting there, getting around
Kangaroo Island access is via the SeaLink Ferry which sails between Cape Jervis, two hours south of Adelaide, and Penneshaw on KI. The journey takes about 45 minutes. Alternatively, you can fly to KI from Adelaide in just 30 minutes.

Wheeling in the fun 
While it can’t claim to be the first compact SUV launched in Australia, the Forester nameplate has still been around long enough to celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2017.

Now into its fourth generation, the Forester has been a stalwart sales success for Subaru, combining the company’s signature all-wheel drive and flat-four engine drivetrain into a boxy, versatile body.

Note, we didn’t say sexy…

The spiritual successor to the much-loved L-Series Touring Wagons initially came in two grades, both powered by a 90kW/176Nm 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine with the choice of manual or automatic transmissions. Pricing started at $26,990 plus on-roads.

Nowadays there are three petrol and one turbo-diesel engine choices and three specification levels. Yes, there is still a 2.0-litre entry-level model, nowadays making 110kW and 198Nm and priced at $30,240.

2017 Subaru Forester 2.0D-L pricing and specifications:
Price: $33,740 (plus on-road costs)
Engine: 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo-diesel
Output: 108kW/350Nm
Transmission: Continuously variable automatic
Fuel: 6.3L/100km (ADR Combined)
CO2: 163g/km (ADR Combined)
Safety Rating: Five-star ANCAP