Day 48 – 20 April 2015
The dust is very noticable in the sunrises and sunsets putting a beautiful orange glow intom the sky. This cold morning was a great example of the orange glow and it looked like this over the Spencer Gulf.
Out camp last night was cold and we switched the heater on at 3am – that is the first time we have needed to do this and it felt good.
The route we followed today took us to Port Augusta and then onto Kimba via Iron Knob. Whilst in Port Augusta it was time to pick up food and fuel (87 Litres @ $1.249). Fuel economy is still sitting about the 18.5 litres per 100kms.
Ok the big decision today Darwin or Perth. Its not everyday you see a sign like this with each destination about 2,500 kms each direction.
It was fun parking the Amesz next to the shovel loader at Iron Knob – WOW those machines are big. This shovels is named Marion and first went into service in June 1965 at a cost of $38,000 and was retired in Oct 1981 after digging a total of 24 million tonnes of ore. The bucket had a capacity of 18 tonnes.
Day 49 – 21 April 2015
We headed off early this morning for the West Coast of the Eyre Peninsular. As we prefer not to travel on the main highway, we turned right into the roads less travelled. Arriving a Darke Peak was interesting and as with many towns and places in the outback their claim to fame was the first hotel to serve from tap XXXX Gold in South Australia. This would make any Queenslander fell at home.
This little hotel was built in a day for the locals to celebrate New Year. Amazing town spirit!
Last stop for the day was Elliston, a place we last visited when Alison broke her leg here 7 years ago. Coffee was good in town and the scenery equally wonderful.
