Weekly Chat (Non-Osprey), 27 August 2017

HAPPY NEW WEEK!

I hope everyone has a wonderful week! 

Young American Kestrel
Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, Texas USA
Photo labelled Public Domain (Copyright Free)

  • We by-passed Burra, on through Mount Bryan & Hallett, arriving Terowie for lunch. All was ready & waiting (burgers, ham & cheese sandwiches & similar), served as quickly as 37 could be served. A drive around the fading town, once a busy train with the change of rail lines from broad gauge to narrow gauge. All goods & people had to transfer to another train until 1970 when the broad gauge line was extended. Then the railway closed early 1990s. Once there were 800-900 people, now perhaps 100. A sleepy town with a general store, post office & roadhouse and empty houses & churches. In WWII Terowie was a busy staging camp, one of the famous to pass through was General Douglas MacArthur. Fed & watered and yes the roadhouse had toilets, back on the bus.

    Two views north of Terowie. We are now beyond Goyder’s Line. It is the end of winter, our rainy season. Not much green.

    The line of trees indicate a creek bed.

  • Next stop Oodla Wirra, I don’t think anything is open anymore. Hotel is closed, old school now a residence. A ruined chapel, roofless and no back wall.

    Nackara, once a small township. A store, hotel, church – all gone, a modern hall, now unused. Good pastoral country but no good for crops as they found out the hard way. No, rain does not follow the plough. The old school has been converted to a retreat centre but the owners are selling due to ill health. With no toilets for miles, our tutor had arranged for us to use those at the retreat centre. Lovely lady provided afternoon tea for a small fee.

  • Good Morning, All.  A dry start, here. Should get some sun here today.

    Thanks for your posts, AQ - will go back and read them now I've woken up!

  • An interesting trip, AQ - I would have gone pale at the mention of few toilets, as I seem to need to know where they are,  everywhere I visit! :-D

  • You're far from the only one, Lindy.  The sheer look of relief when I tell new visitors to Minsmere that the toilets are accessible 24/7 is something I'm very used to seeing.

    Our herring gulls are red listed birds.  Think about that the next time you hear some flaming idiot calling for a cull of them.

  • By the way Monty is still with us and he's posing for the camera.

    Our herring gulls are red listed birds.  Think about that the next time you hear some flaming idiot calling for a cull of them.

  • Lindybird said:
    Today's pic:

    Horses with painted knees or Zebra with their socks rolled down?

    Ospreys Rule OK, but Goldfinches come a close second!

  • OG & Clare - We weren't worried as our bus trip tutor is very good and always allows for many many toilet stops. As well as coffee & lunch stops. Tours are leisurely with plenty of time to wander. Unfortunately I try to see too much in the time allowed!!!!

  • It sounds great, AQ.  Wish I could come, too!

    The sun is going in and out of big white puffy clouds, here. Pottering around, packing up: it's certainly preferable to trying to leave 1st thing in the morning; today we're staying until at least 4.00pm to allow for the daytrippers to leave the coast roads.

    Diane & Annette:  Have had to laugh, long, at a cartoon I just saw of a Tour Guide showing a couple a big rock with a fence around it and saying "And this is the rock which Trump crawled out from under.........."    (Sorry, political and bad taste, but soo funny!!)