Welcome to the new week. Hope all the UK types remembered to put their clocks back. We'll do it in another couple of weeks.
Think I mentioned we had seen 15 herons when we walk at Merkinch 10 days ago. We did the same walk with visiting friends last Monday and saw 20 herons!!!!
This afternoons walk we saw skeins of geese and a red squirrel. How wonderful.
Oh, please ... when can I get back to Scotland?!?!?!?!
Woke at 2.15 am when heavy rain & wind arrived. Here only 8 mm rain though. Elsewhere blackouts, trees down, the usual. Yesterday there were fires across state, all quickly under control, but frustrating that despite fire bans, at least one was deliberately lit.
Saga continued. Port Pirie for afternoon tea. We walked to wharf, all fenced off as it is an international port. I wandered into museum to ask questions but “we are closing in 5 mins”. That’s OK, we are leaving in 15 mins! Now for the long journey to Port Augusta, 90 km. Along the way we had views of the Flinders Ranges, late afternoon, through bus window.
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Zoomed.
From 40 km away we could see a light. It was the 115 metre tower collecting solar power from 23,000 mirrors to heat & cool tomato glasshouses and run the desalination plant (water from Spencer Gulf). A pilot project. (-32.546, 137.84)
Arriving Port Augusta late afternoon, a visit to former water tower in Port Augusta West which the energetic climbed, then on to nearby motel. Rooms allocated, dinner 6.30, bar open 6 pm. I drifted in at 6.15 to find half the bus drinking & partaking of free nibbles (ham, salami, cheese, gherkins). Dinner began with pumpkin soup with chicken pieces. Sounds strange but it was tasty. Main course was serve-yourself from bain marie – calamari, crumbed hoki (NZ fish), roast lamb, chicken wings, hasselback potatoes, pumpkin, cauliflower & cheese sauce, beans. Dessert – pavlova - meringue smothered in mixed berries plus ice cream. Good food, good company. Fell into bed by 9.30 pm. Motel owners had left choc bar & biscuits in each room.
Next morning 7.30 breakfast. Choice of 5 cereals, fruit, juice, toast, tea/coffee, then there was the hot stuff – poached eggs, mushrooms, tomato, hash browns, baked beans. We were all ready & raring to go early. Owners gave us each a bottle of water. They want us to remember them when we next go to Port Augusta!
We drove around town visiting wharf area – now a great place to walk the dog), noted the major buildings. Someone spotted a sculpture in a park and we had to circle back for photos. Camera people took turns snapping each other sitting with the late Joy Baluch, former mayor & quite a character. We circled the almost deserted Sunday morning streets so much that a car stopped to ask if we were lost.
Off to the railway station. It just happened that this weekend was the centenary of the first Transcontinental train leaving Port Augusta for Kalgoorlie. The railway is 1036 miles and the stretch across the Nullarbor Plain, 330 miles, is the longest straight stretch in the world. Anything but boring as I found when I travelled on the Indian-Pacific (as it is now named) in 2014. Engines, carriages, vintage cars on display, lots of people and we left later than our leader hoped. This may confuse Annette where we are LOL.
to be continued
Evening all: Catch up day with paperwork, etc. today. Also wondering why our internet speed seems so slow these days, so I posted a queston on our neighborhood website and found others are experiencing the same issue. Comments came with suggestions for fixes, trouble-shooting, so will tackle those tomorrow.
Heather: Hope that extra hour of non-sleep is now a memory. Ours go back next weekend. Hope daughter's boiler is sorted soon. You're providing all kinds of services: showers for family and car washing facilities for grandson! :-)
AQ: Are those cultivated fields in the foreground of the Flinders Range photo? We had a huge solar farm off Interstate 10 that I can see when I'm driving to Arizona. but not a tower. There used to be a Solar farm out in Dagget that had a tower you could see from miles away. Not sure how the technology has evolved since those early days.... Had to google Hasselback Potatoes. Goodness! Genesee & Wyoming has been very busy over the decades, from their start carrying rock salt just 14 miles from the mine in upstate New York in 1899 to current interests on three continents. Your trips certainly do have me delving into the past, which seems so similar to ours (the U.S.)!
Very cool and cloudy here today. Put away the second patio umbrella until next summer; rain is forecast for later in the week... Fingers crossed we get a nice amount this winter.
Have a good Monday all.
Unknown said:AQ: Are those cultivated fields in the foreground of the Flinders Range photo?
Yes, Annette, wheat I think from memory. Those Telowie Plains have been cropped since land opened to farmers mid-1870s. I meant to say that on our trip we saw lots of farmers harvesting, though crops varied, some quite good, others patchy and or very low.
When I do hasselback potatoes I just make the slices, no toppings!
Good morning. Had a good night and got up early (6:20) - GMT suits me - why do we have to keep changing it! Breakfast ready - BBL.
Ospreys Rule OK, but Goldfinches come a close second!
Good Morning. I woke early, too, then slept, then woke again.....
AQ - Love your pics. I especially like the sculpture with the empty chair, ready for someone to go and join her! Going back again in a minute to read your descriptions again.
Got back home last night weary, after an exciting day seeing all of our grandchildren, as Eldest came over (a nearly 2 hour journey for him) with Amber to celebrate her cousin's birthday. The children all played together very well, and Tomasz, who is now nearly 7 (!) was very patient with the younger ones. Matthew hates fuss, though, and likely to burst into tears if a whole room sings Happy Birthday loudly, so we sang it very softly and didn't all gather round the table when he blew his candles out.
There is such a lot of plastic in the house already, we bought him some books, clothes and a wooden board with a whole set of locks, bolts and fastenings on it for him to discover how to manipulate hardware: pictures of animals behind the little doors.
Good journeys there and back in spite of 18 mile sets of "road improvement" roadworks...... I drove down there, as my OH has a bad back and leg again. He did the return journey, and we wern' t very hungry so had a feast of b.beans on toast!
Bonnie picked up the entire hedgehog, rolled up, in her mouth....
Today's pic:
Think I've put this one on before, but I love it!
Back again. Busy schedule this week – Bloods today, Nurse tomorrow, Mammogram Thursday; meanwhile OH tries to continue painting hall and study ready for when new carpets come! Won’t attempt any today as bathrooms must get cleaned.
Heather – a bonus family visit for you but I hope Daughter’s boiler soon gets fixed or replaced. I hope they enjoyed the helicopter ride.
Dibnlib – love Herons, and spectacular in large numbers. Geese are really pouring in now – must soon be all here!
AQ – have you previously posted a pic of that lady with the empty chair? Looks familiar! Pleased you had at least some rain.
Annette – good luck seeking improvement to internet speed! Patio umbrella is a distant memory here – but even table needs to go away now, and will soon need to disconnect water feature since frosts have started.
Linda – pleased you had such a good family gathering for Matthew’s birthday, and reasonable journeys too. I daren’t mention the speed of Grandson#2’s journey up from Cardiff!! Scary.
Need to “encourage” the worker ( if I sit at my computer he wanders in and sits at his).