Feeling like a holiday now!
Only a short drive today, 300 km plus change. We got out of Adelaide at 8am and had a fuel stop at Port Wakefield.
Not much else to stop for along the way. I had the Prado set at 90kmh and it was pretty happy at that speed. Fuel economy was around 14.5 l/100. The road is almost flat and there was no headwind to contend with … ideal. We might even be able to afford the fuel at that pace.
We got into Port Augusta at 12:30 and did a quick setup and had lunch. The park is pretty barren, but that’s to be expected. Blake and Hannah had a bit of a play at the playground and I scoped out the camp kitchen.
Once we were all settled in we headed out for a look around town. First stop was the Arid Botanic Gardens. It’s well worth the visit. We had a wander around for awhile. Each area is dedicated to the different regions and the plants native to that region. The kids weren’t that fussed … “All the plants look the same!”. But they just don’t get it. It would have been nice to have a bit more time there.
Next stop was the School of the Air … but … well … it’s school holidays ain’t it? So nobody is around. Guess we’ll have to catch up with another branch down the track.
So … on to the RFDS central operations office. The amount of work they get done primarily through donations is mind boggling. Around 40,000 missions each year. Not just the rescue work that springs to mind, but also regular ferrying of patients, regional GP’s, specialists for regional hospitals. Heaps of work. Quite an eye opener.
We got to chat to a few of the pilots and to climb in and around two of the Pilatus PC-12’s. They’ve got 3 planes based at Port Augusta that service all of SA and all the way up to Alice Springs. Each plane is $6 million and carries 1500L of fuel (which is enough to get it to NZ). They’re only single engined, but their glide ability makes up for that. They can actually fly across to Tassie and still be within glide range of land the whole way.
Blake and Hannah had a good look around and hopefully learnt a thing or two. Kel & I certainly did!
Back to the park to get set for dinner. Tonight it’ll be rissoles over at the camp kitchen. The park was near empty when we arrived, but is rapidly filling up now. The kids have called a truce and are now occupying themselves. Hannah is getting stuck into some school work, while Blake is reading a novel … while Kel is doing the task of inline spell and grammar checker for this post.
OOooohh …nearly forgot … Happy Birthday Pa !!! 85 years young!
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