We left behind Port Augusta and the extremely loud girls in the tent behind us who Sharon got management to quieten down yesterday evening. Can’t they work out their tent is not a house and everything they do or say is heard by everybody nearby and their music choices from the tinny sound system were even worse. I think the bald mean looking tattooed guy had just had about enough as well so we did them a favor I think.

Last night we met a French couple in the camp kitchen who are out here for 11 months doing an interesting project. They are out here proving or disproving all the clichés they have about Australians and seeing if they are true or not by going and looking and finding out about them. She was diligently writing in her diary plus they have a blog, website and face book page. They are linked up with some classroom and students back in France as well. You can submit a cliché to them to check out. They have working visa’s and they have been working in shearing sheds a bit so far. They have their trip going in the wrong direction at the wrong times though and will end up in Darwin soon at the wrong time of the year, just how it worked out. Look them up by (clicking here), use Google Translate to convert to english when required.

We had a 15c voucher for Caltex and with a big fill it was worth a short detour. We rocked up at 7:45 to some massively obese woman waddling around the bowsers who promptly told us they were closed till 8AM. A few others rocked up and I told them the happy news. We all did our windows, water and checked oil etc to waste time. At 7:59 she came back out and put up all the advertising on the poles and shortly after the pumps sprang to life. We were then all cued trying to pay but the discount on a truck fill is worth it. They try to con you to get another 4c per litre off if you spend $5 in the shop, yeah right, buy your discount with their over priced rubbish, not that stupid!

We headed off in search of the Flinders Ranges. We have decided to do random things along the way now as there is not enough time to do anything properly now. We would want at least a week or more in the Flinders anyway so it’s just a taster for our next trip here and a quick look around at camping and attractions. The first major town we crossed through was Quorn. We had to give way to a steam engine here at the railway crossing. Sunday must be train day here. I stopped in the parking area and refitted our one and only shock. The bracket is cracked but it’s not getting any worse and if it breaks now it does not really matter.

Up the road between Quorn and Hawker there are several old historic sites from the 1870’s and later. Old homesteads, shearing sheds and grave sites. We stopped at the Kanyaka historic site and had a look at the rather impressive stone homestead ruins and the unusual stone shearing shed. There was a short 1.5Km walk here down to some other ruins and Death Rock. Death Rock is supposed to be where aboriginal people buried their dead. There is also a permanent water hole here in the river for stock watering and in days gone by was a place to water horses and droved stock.

Homestead area

The gaps are for the sheep to come out from the shearing stands

Death rock

Hey these things aren’t too bad…..

A small selection of flies on the ankle

Next stop just before Hawker was the Yourambulla Caves, an aboriginal rock art site on the side of the hill. There are 3 sites that have paintings very different to what we have seen further up. We forgot to take water thinking it was going to be very short walk and we were a bit dehydrated when we finally got back to the car not helped by a 15min detour we did not have to take up a hill.

Finally at Hawker the seismic capital of Australia. Apparently there is more seismic activity here than anywhere else in Australia. The local servo has a seismograph that they maintain for who ever manages these things. They change the paper once a day and each rotation of the drum is 15 minutes. There was a bit of activity about an hour befor we arrived and some more earlier in the day. The actual seismograph is 20Km away and the telemetry comes in via a radio link. They had a few copies of the readings they got for the Boxing Day Tsunami and a whole bunch of other big events.

Things you find in an outback servo

Some recent activity today

We rocked out the the southern Flinders Ranges and took the gravel Moralana Scenic Drive. The ranges looked fantastic, it is so scenic driving along. We stopped for lunch at Black Gap. The Heysen walking trail comes through here and you can walk this short section to Dick Knob and on to Wilpena Pound. We decided not to though as it was too hot and the bloody flies were carrying us away again. We did walk up to the first high point and had a look around before leaving. Down the road is an old restored Bullock cueing yards from 1870’s.

The rest of the day was taken up driving up and around to the Brachina Gorge area. There are several campsites in the national park close by and after checking a couple out we ended up back tracking to the first one, Teamster Campsite. We have the place to ourselves where further in there are lots of people plus the view here is great with all the high hills around us. There is a huge cave in the hill we will check out in the morning. The flies are still murder so we have hidden in the camper with all the windows open. We will go and do a few more random things in the Flinders and probably spend another night here before heading to Victoria for the last phase of our wonderful trip.

Campsite for tonight