Advertisement
Published: April 27th 2013
Edit Blog Post
Sunrise over the Station
Hawker at sun up. The hills glow just as in the photo. Friday 27th
We woke to a beautiful morning. Some times it is the sunrise photo that impresses, but this morning I quickly grabbed Marg's camera and took a photo of the station homestead behind the camp ground as it and the hills behind glowed with the rising sun. Only in the outback in these red soiled areas do you get this glow, and it is always a hit with photographers and viewers alike.
We made an early start to Port Augusta as we wanted to be there early for easy parking close to the supermarket, before heading off to Iron Knob, and then down the Eyre Peninsular for the next 6 or 7 days.
The drive south was easy, but as it was still early Marg had to make space on the road for sheep, goats, kangaroos, emus and anything else that thought it had right of way. There are some long stretches here with unfenced pasture, hence the wanderers on the road.
Before we left home I fitted a couple of Kangaroo Whistles to the front bumper. They emit a whistle tone out of human audible range, but within Kangaroo range. A couple of days earlier
there were 3 kangaroos in full flight headed our way on collision course. They stopped in their tracks short of the road and veered away. The 'roos that crossed today were ahead of us be we noted that they looked right and ran fast out of the way. So maybe they do work, but we find we need to be vigilant.
Heading south we passed through Quorn, another outback town with typical SA stone buildings. Quorn has a claim to fame with the Pichi Nichi Railway. This is a narrow gauge train run by volunteers from Quorn to Port Augusta, and as it happens, tomorrow (Sat) is one of their big live steam days. They have a large railway workshop (to maintain locos, rolling stock and track maintenance), and this reminded me of my apprenticeship days.
The road to Port Augusta swings west here, and then we crossed the bottom of the Flinders ranges to come out at the head of the Spencer Gulf.
There was an unusual rock formation on this road - it looked like slices of corned beef or bacon.
We have crossed Port Augusta twice before and due to low tides and
marshy smells didn't stop other than for fuel. In fact the town is quite nice, quaint buildings and a good range of shops. Obviously alive and well, and a contrast to Hawker and the small towns of the outback.
We made our camp for the night by lunch time, so we enjoyed the opportunity to go walk about and chill out.
Iron Knob was really the birthplace of BHP and the steel industry in Australia. However, the mine closed for economic reasons and left behind another ghost town. There are about 150 people here still, and they run little volunteer type services such as this neat camping spot which is kept wonderfully clean and well presented, a museum and tours of the old mine. Things may look up for these people as the mine lease was sold recently and the new owners are gearing up to continue mining. As the price of ore has climbed, it becomes economic to open the mine, but they do have one technical issue to resolve. The mine closed for safety reasons that came about from tot opening the top of the mine wide enough to safely burrow down. Hence, with the small
base at the bottom of the mine, the steep walls and amphitheatre effect, any blasting shook the walls, roads, machinery and people very seriously, and were fortunate that there were not serious injuries. So they are moving the tailings and overburden (40% iron) to get at the best ore (70+%) to mine for the next 40 years. They have rebuilt and just tested the train line down to the One Steel works at Whyalla.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.07s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 11; qc: 26; dbt: 0.0496s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Mum & Dad
non-member comment
Another interesting blog
Hi to the Gypsies! Thanks for the photos and comment. We can't get over the dry country and the rocky nature of the land. Hard to scratch a living in some of those places.