Glendambo was where we stopped for some lunch and just kept on going. We have been travelling with Dave, Robyn, Tristan and Andrew along with Gary and Deanna. We stopped along the way at Woomera where I was shocked to see that it is a ghost town these days with a population of 100-400 depending upon the airforce work there. I cant understand what happens with all the old infrastructure in this town with an old theatre (complete with 1950s original furniture, deco signage and all the original timber signage) and all the buildings. It walked around this place and felt so weird. All of a sudden I turned around Robyn was gone, I had this bad feeling that aliens had taken her away. It was a freaky place. Surely a simple government change will not close a town - I can not get over this and will do some more questioning about this place. I know Chris M grew up here with his family as his father worked in the defence force. The supermarket was open and the single employee was there in a shop that reminded me of the 1950s in design and shelf size. So much recent history is not being covered in our schools. I am interested in the Woomera Prohibited Area and can see why this place was chosen but even though it is remote I think about environmental damage that misle and weapons testing has done.
Way have done seven hours of driving and when we got to Port Augusta we all stopped for some KFC
We have kept coming along the Stuart Highway and made our way past Crystal Brook, Stirling and finally Burra where we met Kim and Travis for dinner at the La Pecora Nera - an authentic Italian wood oven pizza eatery (3 Thames St, Burra PH - 88922886) wheee they were out of pasta (as it is made fresh each day they hadn't expected over 80 covered so none for us) so we had their wonderful pizzas and shared breads, antipasto and about 5 different pizzas. Met a lovely family who have been helping in an indigenous community on Horne WA/NT boarder adm discussed my growing concerns with the ever widening fan between us and them. (Big discussion about the last round up in the 1980s)
We stayed at the motel in Burra as we could simply go straight to bed, sleep, be warm, get up early, shower (hot, nice and unending) and go again. Today, Thursday 24th April we have about 900km till home. We have gone through Morgan, Renmark (nothing to declare as we are coming into the state and not leaving) and have 142km till Muldura where we will need fuel and food. This treck home is hard, I am hot and bothered with the sun streaming in on my side of the car and we are obviously both tired and irritable and keen to get home and relax. But relaxing will not be on the cards as the will be so much cleaning and unpacking to do, washing, cleaning, sorting and a whole new world of camping gear to store and organise!
Mapping has never been a strong point of mine but navigating through Mildura I found that my skills and memory were accurate and this enabled me to get us onto the A79 Calder Highway successfully. We then made our way to St Arnaud and then turned onto the Calder Highway through Avoca, bypassed Ballarat on the Western Highway onwards to home. It has been a huge trip and a huge day of driving today and we are both looking forward to seeing Shelby and Matt who has been looking after the house. I will have to calculate how many litres of fuel we have used but it would be up near 1400L at a guess. The odometer is reading is 7380km but Tim is not 100% sure of that calculation as it has 79,800 on it and had not tarred it since being serviced. We have certainly done a lot of kilometres and are feeling it now that we are home!
Thanks everyone who was a part of this trip, thanks to those who have followed this blog and commented and thanks to all who have read about this trip. A wonderful adventure! Thanks again David, Robyn and Peter for the wonderful track research and support.
PS. The red headed spider we saw at the mining quarry off Binns Track was a red headed mouse spider - they dig a mouse like burrow and is very poisonious but not aggressive. We saw a male one and have photos on the Lumix camera.
PSS. We survived the trip with only three car washes, six loads of washing and heaps of sleep.
PSsS. Where to next? Wait and see!
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