New South Wales/Camberra

Hi all,
 Well we left a very wet Victoria behind and tried for better weather at Eden on the south coast of NSW, not to be, rain and a cold wind, visited the whaling museum there and learned about the shore whaling operations which was only possible with the help of killer whales which herded whales into the bay, didn't learn that at school.
Up to Bega and the mandatory visit to the cheese factory for a comprehensive tasting session, the museum stairs made me feel a little old where the machinery and tools etc were things we used as kids, great display.
After a wet camp at Drummond Creek we headed for Canberra to visit my Niece and family for a few days, warm sunny weather at last !  even the remnants of a dust storm in the air.
It was great to see the family as the little ones had grown so much since we last saw them,  about 5 years ago, way too long as far as I am concerned, made me realise just how short life is and how fast it goes. We had so much to catch up with each others lives, events, anniversaries and just stuff in general.
Thanks heaps Mike and Rebecca
Then on and across to the coast once more to see the Ocean Cliffs Road, now that was an experience! that road down to Shellbourne( near Woolongong) on the coast was equal to best NZ has to offer by way of twists and bends ( about as good as the Alpine Hwy) only down hill, hairpin bends etc etc with Kath driving again.
Our reason was to drive the Ocean Cliff Road, it runs around a rocky headland on concrete piers with spectacular views. That is the road used for some car adds.
Then it was up the range again and off to the Blue Mountains to visit with my Nephew Colin and his family.
Now we have experienced the full gamut of weather - bloody hail stones as big as cherries and walnuts ! Next afternoon it was small pea sized stuff followed by a few days fo glorious sunshine, again it was fantastic to catch up, we are really enjoying these times with family.
Huge hugs to all Colin, Mel and Amelia.
Now we are in Sydney with my brother and his wife for Christmas and Boxing Day prior to heading north again as our trip is  rapidly drawing to a close unfortunately.
Not many photo's this time as for us it was family time.
Merry Christmas to everyone.
Bob n Kath.

Adelaide to Victoria 14/12

Hi my faithful followers,
It has been a long time between drinks, first the Internet was so slow I grew a beard while stuff loaded then we had none but I definitely wasn't about house the sat phone as a link, not at those prices!
We arrived in Adelaide and booked into the van park as Kath flew home for a night to attend her Class Graduation, Huge thanks Killian for organising the flights. The kids were both surprised and happy Kath went to the effort to attend, a few of the parents were as well, not to mention her fellow teachers.
Headed south towards Banrock Station winery, surprise surprise where we had lunch and a few samples, we also obtained a couple of 'souvenirs' to bring back.
Ended up in Victoria where we visited Bushland Dingo rescue centre, meet Gill the owner and spend quite some time talking and seeing all her dogs, about 30 odd from all states of Australia, she doesn't breed them so keeps the gene pool pure. Fascinating lady.
Kept following the Murray River Valley Hwy and camped on the Murray River that night, absolutely bloody hot, even the wind was 39C, didn't cool down much until early hours of the morning.
Visited Glenrowan for lunch with Ned Kelly, fantastic little Cafe with excellent food.
Then on to Browns Brothers Cellar Door for a few more samples as Kath usually drinks their Cienna red when dining out. The crowd was huge as it was also their comedy festival afternoon so we didn't linger very long and headed out to Edi Cutting for the night and yep, rained again but at least it wasn't very windy. We heard a large tree come crashing down up the hill from us, happy we were in the open part.
Then off to Swift Creek via the Alpine Way Hwy, now that is an experience I will never forget ! The road is narrow, mores bends than an epileptic snake with sheer drop offs beside the road and NO guard rails, Kath was driving so to say I was a tad nervous is an understatement. Kath has a habit of steering towards what she looks at so came way to close to the edge for my liking a few times. Stopped at the top at Mt Hotham for lunch and changed over drivers, the souther side is a total contrast, still a little bendy but no drop offs.
We caught up with good friends Greg and Ann Batt, had a really enjoyable few days with them, Greg showed us around his patch of Victoria, it is really very scenic and peaceful. Visited Lakes Entrance, many little towns and up into the State Forest Fire lookout and the legendary high country cattle runs,  old steam winches and hoists used in the timber industry, saw a couple of snakes, wild brumbies and the views were sensational, even saw a wombat just up the gully from their home. All in all a very memorable few days.
The last photo is basically their back yard, beautiful ranges.
Huge Thank you Greg and Ann,
Well it started raining again so we left and headed towards East Gipsland and Eden, more adventures to come.
Stay safe.
Bob n Kathy

                                               On a hot summers night

                                              Alpine dingo

                                                                  down Kosiosko way

                                                         Lkes Entrance

                                                High country huts- usual graffiti

                                             steam winch and boiler

Greg and Ann's back yard.

Barossa to Adelaide Hills 29/11 to 1/12/18

Hi folks,
It has been awhile since our last entry, some highlights and a few disappointments along the way.
The Barossa Valley hasn't changed since we were last here, still expensive however we managed to find a little family owned German bakery in Tanunda with exceptional food! Kath enjoyed a home made Parsty full of fresh diced veggies and a flakey pastry to die for. I enjoyed a lamb kebab type thing with a German name, the texture and flavour combination was superb. A visit to the cheese factory was also ignorer prior to the tasting trip. First stop was Rockford to stock up on our home supplies, then off to Bethany to add a new dimension to that order. We tried a few different wines but nothing really suited our tastes.
We left Barossa and headed for a little town called Hahndorf, a really picturesk place comprising of mainly heritage buildings of sand stone, solid split timbers with a very friendly atmosphere. We had lunch at the Blacksmith Cafe which is in an old blacksmiths shop, hand hewn timbers and the walls were sealed with clear plastic sheeting - very different but the food was great, again home made on the premises.
After some exploring we spent the night at the Caravan Park ( great weather) and caught the Bus next morning over to Mt Barker for their Christmas Pageant, there were over 95 floats in the Parade besides the Clowns and various other fill in's, a very enjoyable morning, return bus fare was $2.80 for both of us - old fart rates 😀.
After leaving we travelled via Echunga, Strathallyn to Longhorn creek for the night - cold and windy again. That stuff is following us I think. Went up to the Prospect Hill Museum which we were told was a great machinery and heritage place, not sure when that was as the machines were covered in rust, dust and cobwebs, the rest wasn't much better - the whole thing needs a thorough overhaul - didn't even have running water in the toilets! Very disappointing so we left.
Heading for Victor Harbour, next blog.
There are a heap more photo's but the down load is pathetic here, 10 minutes per photo ! I will down load a heap when I can get a faster internet.
Stay safe.
Bob n Kath

Whyalla 28/11/18

Hi folks,
We were a bit disappointed with Port Lincoln, the things we wanted to see weren't available, so while the Toyota had a service at Peter Kittle - fantastic staff, work well done and well priced. Kath and I spent a couple of hours in the excellent Library there, oh and Kath loved the Lounge Chair Sculpture.
Drove in to see Talia Cave, the most amazing thing for me was the colour of the different types of rock, a salmon pink sand stone with yellow and orange sedimentary above it.
Then up to Cowell for the night, really quite little place right on the beach front, $10 a night, we saw the rain coming so it was an early start with a  hurried pack up and just in time too as it absolutely bucketed down for the next 30 minutes or so while we drove north towards Whyalla, did the usual visit to the Info Centre there, just walked in the door when we were asked if we would like to do the Tour of the HMAS WHYALLA, why not so off we went with Liz and found out all about the first Corvette built in the ship yards, her war service as a mine sweeper and is now proudly in centre place at the museum. The rain caught up during the tour but was gone by the time we finished.
They advised us that the best free camp was out near Cape Lowell Light house on the edge of Fitzgerald Bay, had a look at that and the SANTOS oil/gas import-export facility nearby but they do not do tours.We found a reasonably sheltered spot for the night and woke this morning to see a pod of dolphins feeding just off the beach in front of us, easy drive back to Town for the tour of the steel mill, very interesting and informative. We were shown the full cycle of events from the raw hematite to the finished product, it was interesting to see a  billet of steel about 3 meters long come out of a furnace soft as plaster sine then these being rolled out into 29 mtr railway line, the enriched pellets for export,very different to what I expected although it is still disappointing when, yes it is foreign owned. Australia owns bugger all when it comes to our resources, huge profits go overseas.
Saw an article about how King George Whititng was around $90 / kilo so we had lunch on the foreshore of whiting, salad and chips for $19.95, very nice it was too.
We had an easy afternoon drive over to Petersborough where we are spending the night, still windy but the cloud has gone and higher temps are expected over the next few days, we hope so anyway as these cold, gusty winds are wearing very thin.
Off to revisit the Barossa Valley tomorrow and restock the cellar.
Stay happy
Bob n Kath

                                                                     SATOS facility

                                                manufacturing Coke-coal for the blast furnace

                                                            quenching the coke with 65,000 ltr of water

Port Lincoln 25/11/18

Hi family and friends,

After doing the full Mine tour down into the mine, nothing really going on so a bit of a waste of time, there has been 2 land slips in the last couple of months with the last one on Friday am so everything is now closed down until the repatriation work is completed which may take over 12 months.
We left Kalgoorlie behind we headed south towards Norseman with anO/N camp just north of there, still very windy as the locals refer to it as  Blovember. Re-fueled and headed out, Kath hasn't been across So it was a new experience for her, she couldn't believe the view from the lookout at Caiguna where the road drops down off Hampton Tablelands and out across the treeless plain. We did the 3 official lookouts and a couple of others made by locals. We also ran into a Sweedish bloke who is cycling around Australia, we had met him at Tom Price weeks ago so it was great to catch up and share a few experiences, his friend who he had met up with a week or so ago has one of those lay down pedal type of cycle and both had a laugh when he related the story of how he fell asleep while peddling.
Camped for the night 20 k's west of Nullarbor, still blowing a gale and bloody cold southerly, Kath wasn't in a good mood as the fruit fly inspection station bloke left a lot to be desired in both attitude and speech, just about emptied our fridge of stuff not even listed on their pamphlet. not happy Jan.
Anyway into Ceduna for fuel, not much to see or do around there so we headed south towards Streaky Bay, what a top little place that is ! heaps of places to visit and the views are fantastic. This country never ceases to amaze me with it's contrasts, one minute there are cliffs with huge waves battering their bases then around the corner there are blinding white beaches with a gentle shore break, rocky bluffs with a colony of breeding sea lions, unreal experience to look down on them just doing their thing at a very leisurely pace. I visited the Power House Museum while Kath caught up with her diary, that Museum is packed with vintage motors of all makes, models and sizes and the best part is that they run. There were 4 older blokes (volunteers)  running the show and they are only too happy to chew the cud about the engines and Strat any one of them up if you are interested. My favourite type is the older style Blackstone open crank, theirs was a 1907 job and it started first rotation of the fly wheel, music to my ears, he then started another style of open crank which was driving a water pump - yes it was pumping water so I did a short video of it. Unfortunately closing time came about too dam quick so I had to leave.
Short drive south and camped up for the night, yes, we were in bed by 6pm as it was still a very cold windy night.
Did some sight seeing further down the coast and O/N at Point Drummond, we found a little spot with a bit of shelter from the wind but it was still into bed at 6pm to get warm.
We are now in Port Lincoln as the truck needs a service tomorrow which equates to just over 12000 K's since we left home.
We are off to do a seafood factory tour while that is being done, back here to the van park tomorrow night then away to Adelaide on Tuesday all things being equal.
Stay happy.
Bob n Kath

Tourist in Kal 19/11/18

Hi folks.
All went well with a great little free camp at Lake Douglas, 7k's west of town, clean facilities with were cleaned daily and rubbish as well. Did a quick look around for an hour or so before returning to camp.
Well we spent 3 days as tourists in Kalgoorlie/Boulder, a very interesting place to see, it started out with a lightening show, spectacular that was as it moved from the north around the west and disappeared south, very little wind and no rain.
I took a couple of shots but the mosquitoes started to attack so I left it at that.

The hour long scenic flight out to Lake Leroy and back over the Super Pit was well with it, the number of open cut mines around here is unbelievable, some are still working and others are just partly filled with ground water( salty as hell )fenced and closed up.  The ground water is used for most of the mine workings as fresh water is piped in from Perth and as such not wasted. There is one mine actually in the Lake it's self, lucky it doesn't flood, they have sunk bores down into the artesian basin for their fresh supplies. Looks really weird to see a boron the middle of a massive salt lake.
Then back over town to the Super Pit which at present is the 3 rd largest open cut in the world at 3.3 k long, 1.5 wide and 600m deep, with the future expansion planned it should become the largest. The only thing about it is that it is owned by a joint American/Canadian company, all gold is sold to the Australian Government at current world prices and all profits go overseas! Talk about stupid Government buying our own resources, same goes for Gas production, iron ore etc, we are just great at giving away our assets.
We did the Markets on Sunday morning, same old same old you get at every market in any town so nothing new there, Took Kath out to see her first 2 up game played. The game is held here every Sunday afternoon and seeing the money being thrown around stunned Kath, minimum bet was $50, needless to sawyer didn't join in although Kath would have loved to have a go at tossing the pennies.

Came back into town and just enjoyed looking at thebeautifull old building preserved in their original state including the only legal house of ill repute - Hay St brothel.
Then it was off to the Mining museum where there is a vault with about $6 M worth of gold nuggets,  ingots, old jewellery, coins etc on display, that was something to see as was a push bike made by an old prospector from scrounged timber.

After all that, it is now time to head south and out across the Eyre Highway- Nullarbor Plains so it may be a few days before we are back in circulation.

Catch you on the flip.

Bob n Kath