Blogs from Port Augusta, South Australia, Australia, Oceania - page 5

We left you sweating in the 42 degree heat of Delhi. Due to the horror stories we'd heard from people passing through Delhi ("a woman was mugged outside my hotel room", "i saw a man being beaten up by a gang outside my hotel room" etc) and the fact it was going to be so hot, we really had prepared ourselves for the worst, we were expecting all our nightmares of armless, blinded beggars to come true there. However, and although we could only see a small proportion of the city in our 24 hours there, we found a well planned out, wide roaded, (relatively) clean city. For whatever reason Monday is the day all the public buildings including art galleries, museums and the famous Red Fort close. So we were absolved from the need to ... read more

Sunday 24th April 2011 We visited the Australian Arid Lands Botanic Garden in Port Augusta - checked out the Matthew Flinders Lookout and went on a tour about edible plants in our native bush. This garden is dedicated to planting all native plants from all around Australia - even has an area which has only native plants and trees from the Kimberleys. This garden is only in its early years so would love to see it many years in the future. Monday 25th April 2011 (Anzac Day) We had a fantastic day today - the weather was just beautiful about 26 degrees - great drive from Port Augusta up to Willmington through the South Flinders ranges - the drive through the ranges was just beautiful hard to capture on the camera. The view over the gulf ... read more

Hi to our wonderful family and friends, after a mostly sleepless night due to an invasion of hundreds of noisy, squawking white cockatoos, we left Broken Hill at about 9.30am. Headed down south and into South Australia. Once again we had to stop for lunch and eat all our fruit and salad bits. We only had to hand in 1 x potato, 5 x onions and some celery. It was a very enjoyable trip, wide, flat open land. Only saw groups of emus and wild goats again and not one single kangaroo. As we moved further south we ran into sheep and cattle country. We have travelled through many quaint little country towns and hardly seen a person. Once again we were awestruck by the changing scenery, from barren plains to rolling green hillsides. Our road ... read more

We couldn’t have been more disappointed when we woke up to find that last nights 30 degree heat had been replaced with grey sky and a persistent drizzle. Our day didn’t get any better when the new gas bottle we bought wouldn’t turn off properly. We had to pack up and drive around town to find someone who could help us disconnect the bottle. Luckily it wasn’t leaking as it was turned off at the stove but we did have a rather tense hour of driving about while I looked after the gas bottle in the back. We found someone to help us fix the problem but our relaxing day had disappeared by then. We went back to the campsite and started preparing Hilda for the outback. Andy did all the washing while I rebuilt the ... read more

Today dawned overcast and cold and we stayed in bed until 8am. After breakfast we went up the road to Quorn to check out tomorrow’s rail trip and then down the road to Port Augusta. We first visited Wadlata Heritage Tunnel but it was so cold inside we only stayed a short time but what we did see looked fantastic. It traces the history of South Australia from the days of Primeval Forest, the Aboriginies, European Explorers and the mining companies. We had lunch in the café by which time the sun had come out and warmed us up. We next went to the Arid Lands Botanic Gardens and enjoyed some beautiful walks in the sun - no wind either. We returned to our cabin to find the owners dog out on the main road so ... read more