April 30 – Stephen’s birthday. Drove to Roxby Downs to fulfil his birthday wish (no not that), to visit the BHP Billiton mine, as one does!!!! No tour on the Thursday so we spent the day riding our bikes around Roxby. An interesting town with a population of around 4500, of which approx 25% are aged 15 and under, mainly young families. Made birthday dinner of chops, mash potatoes and vegies, yes that is what he wanted!!
Friday Stephen was up early for his tour of the mine. His other wish for his birthday (still not that) was that I not go; I was very happy with this arrangement as I hate mine tours. I will let Stephen tell you all about his very exciting morning while I yawn.
Stephen: one of the interesting facts of the Olympic Dam was that on the day of my visit BHP Billiton released an EIS that addressed the proposal to convert the current underground mine to an open cut that would ultimately be the biggest open cut mine in the world. To reach the ore body they would need to excavate the topsoil to a depth of 350 metres and a diameter of >1km. This means moving 1 million cubic metres of soil every day for between 1-2 years. I’d like to see that!!!!! Back to Anne.
Facts and figures and mines - BOOORING. Left Roxby after lunch an
d drove to Glendambo. I hope the road isn’t going to be like this all the way – kilometre after kilometre of flat rocky earth, white line, white line. Glendambo Roadhouse was a place we won’t bother talking about; let’s just say we were up really early the next day to move on.
Stephen: one of the interesting facts of the Olympic Dam was that on the day of my visit BHP Billiton released an EIS that addressed the proposal to convert the current underground mine to an open cut that would ultimately be the biggest open cut mine in the world. To reach the ore body they would need to excavate the topsoil to a depth of 350 metres and a diameter of >1km. This means moving 1 million cubic metres of soil every day for between 1-2 years. I’d like to see that!!!!! Back to Anne.
Facts and figures and mines - BOOORING. Left Roxby after lunch an
d drove to Glendambo. I hope the road isn’t going to be like this all the way – kilometre after kilometre of flat rocky earth, white line, white line. Glendambo Roadhouse was a place we won’t bother talking about; let’s just say we were up really early the next day to move on.Kilometres of nothing
Saturday drove to Coober Pedy. My God, it appears the road isn’t going to change. We arrived in CP about lunchtime and set up camp. We now have it down to 15 minutes, each with our own little jobs. Still no fights or arguments, don’t quite know what is happening, we seem to be in new territory. Could we be relaxed and happy???? We spent the afternoon relaxing in the sun and waiting for 4pm when we could have a drink without looking like soaks.
Sunday we took a tour of CP and again spent the afternoon in the sun. CP is an interesting town, not much to look at, but has an interesting history with the opal mining. Wrote a letter to the grandchildren and we are anxiously waiting for a letter from Fynn to arrive sometime in the next few days.
Underground House - Opal Mines Mounds
Monday morning we were up bright and early as we had booked to go on the Mail Run from CP to William Creek to Oodnadatta and back to CP, a total of 12 hours and 45 minutes. A fabulous day. Peter, the mailman, takes guests (13) out in his big Oka, a 4 wheel drive the size of a tank. We passed the dingo fence, kilometres of open land with the landscape changing every hundred k’s or so from moon plains to sand dunes to rocks that shone like glass. Every now and again you would see a tree or bushes but not very often. Conditions were so harsh I have no idea how the explorers ever had the determination to forge across this land, especially as they walked all the way, unable to call a taxi!! Peter was full of stories and yarns and I swear, did not stop talking all day. We had lunch at William Creek and dinner at the Pink Roadhouse in Oodnadatta. I have absolutely no inclination to return to Oodnadatta, what a dive. The most interesting house was one that had a lovely grass front lawn of about 4 x 15 metres with a ride on mower in the driveway and about 5 dozen empty beer cans in a pile at the front door. We delivered the mail to 6 homesteads along the way. The first, Anna Creek, which is literally the same size as Belgium, had a lovely old stone house with lots of outbuildings, but the rest were just modest 3 bedroom houses with a tin roof and lots of sheds and old machinery around. Interesting to see that herds of horses have been replaced by herds of Hondas and Yamahas at all the homesteads.
Sand Dunes going to William Creek - Anna Creek Homestead
William Creek Pub - note the push bikes
Oodnadatta Track
Oodnadatta Town - Sunsets over Oodnadatta
Breakaways
Tuesday we took a scenic flight over Lake Eyre. Interesting to see from the sky all we had seen the day before by road. We flew North East over the Davenport Ranges to the lake. The focus of the flight was the northern part of the lake and especially the Warburton River and the flood plains which are currently feeding Lake Eyre courtesy of the Queensland floods. Flocks of pelicans have turned up to breed and we saw some swans and ducks but must say was a little disappointed we didn’t see more wildlife. The lake is vast but only has about 3cms of water in it and you can quite easily see the bottom. We flew down to 500 metres and had a wonderful overall view of the surrounds. We can now say we have seen Lake Eyre with water in it, but cannot say we have seen it without water, which is a bit weird. Went out to the Breakaway in the late afternoon to a spectacular site. It is too hard to describe so look at the photos. We had a drink sitting on the back of the ute and watched the sun go down with a couple of young German backpackers.
Tuesday we took a scenic flight over Lake Eyre. Interesting to see from the sky all we had seen the day before by road. We flew North East over the Davenport Ranges to the lake. The focus of the flight was the northern part of the lake and especially the Warburton River and the flood plains which are currently feeding Lake Eyre courtesy of the Queensland floods. Flocks of pelicans have turned up to breed and we saw some swans and ducks but must say was a little disappointed we didn’t see more wildlife. The lake is vast but only has about 3cms of water in it and you can quite easily see the bottom. We flew down to 500 metres and had a wonderful overall view of the surrounds. We can now say we have seen Lake Eyre with water in it, but cannot say we have seen it without water, which is a bit weird. Went out to the Breakaway in the late afternoon to a spectacular site. It is too hard to describe so look at the photos. We had a drink sitting on the back of the ute and watched the sun go down with a couple of young German backpackers.
Wharburton River
Lake Eyre
Wednesday we cleaned up, did some washing, went on a ride, wrote some stuff for the blog and generally did not do too much. Our letter from Fynn arrived. “Dear Grandma and Grandad, I hope you have fun at the beach. Love Fynn.” We have seen lots of sand Fynn, but not much water. Now that the letter has arrived we can now leave CP. Another hard day at the office!!
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