After the Port Augusta caravan park excitement when the police, ambulance and two fire trucks turned up just before we left for what we don’t know but there was several caravan fire alarms that went off a few times during the breakfast period? They had everything under control so off we went. We are getting away earlier each time we pack up as we get into a routine of sorts. Some sequence is slowly emerging.

Having no idea what the day was we could not understand why some of the shops were closed as we tried to get a few supplies on the way out of Port Augusta. We headed out along the Stuart Highway to Pimba where we turned off to Woomera to have a look at the rocket range. I (col) found it very interesting looking at the old electronic systems and technology of the time. Sharon found it interesting but in a different way. Woomera has a bowling alley and two olympic size swimming pools, a result of the US presence here in days gone by.

Google Len Beadle for some very interesting history of early road making and how he surveyed Woomera, Maralinga and another 6,000KM of remote roads. He has written six books on his times in the outback and must have been a real character going by the information at Woomera. He wore out 12 jeeps in his time surveying roads. He noted his crew on average repaired 6 punctures a day while in the remote country.

There is a huge amount of interesting history here and it’s still being actively used today. The Japanese tested a mach 2.2 supersonic jet prototype here only a couple of years ago. The Rocket museum was very well presented and only $6ea to get in. There is a large display of recovered items and some of the drone aircraft used in the main street as well. The scale of some of these rockets is quite large!

Fuel jumped to $1.755L at Glendambo. We did not need any here today. Stopped early tonight to dry a few bits out so we are camped in a free roadside stop tonight with a bunch of others about 170KM short of Cooper Pedy. The QLD guy next to us says $1.755L is cheap, it’s $2.15L up the road and stays that way except for in Alice Springs. You can’t go without it so you just suck it up and pass over the credit card I guess.

The QLD caravan next to us has satellite TV, diesel heater, four water tanks and just about everything else you can think of, he called them “big boys toys” because of what they cost!