29th May 2026: packed up and parked just out of town. Had a coffee at the Station Store then walked to the Powerhouse Museum- more memorabilia and the remains of the old Power station for Winton fueled variously by wood and coal then gas and then diesel with all equipment left in situ. You certainly learnt how electricity was generated over the years and what touch conditions of heat and dust the engineers worked under. We then set off for Winton, stopping by the Thompson River to look at it and the many birds of prey there, in addition to welcome swallows and galahs.

We went to the Pelican Caravan park, a short walk from town, and set up the van, including a load of washing using artesian bore water( “crystal clear, but contains dissolved sulphur  gas, so smells bad”). We walked into and around town at dusk. I cooked salmon and corn patties with a green salad for dinner.

                               River system Central Aus
                                                         Power house
Thompson River
                                          Whistling Kite
Cooking dinner







Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image
 June 2nd: We investigated the 2 waterholes/walks available to us here at Mt Hart. Firstly we went to Matthew Gorge where there were a group of Outback spirit clients who had been flown in from Broome because of the road closures. Matthew Gorge was surrounded by many squarecut black rocks on all sides. We caught up with Kurt who was now one of their tour guides. We had a swim in the Gorge then Nic and I followed the gorge upstream doing a lot of rock hopping. We went a fair way up but not to the very end.  We then visited Barker Pool where we were the only ones there- saw the usual collection of birds - lots of Willy Wagtails , peaceful doves, tiny pale yellow honeyeaters and blackfaces cuckoo shrikes not to mention ravens and magpie larks. We returned to camp and had a walk along the banks of the Barker River bleeding the camp site. We had dinner at the restaurant- rack of lamb for Nic and Shark Bay Snapper for me! We visited Kurt who is sleeping in his car in the camp ground...
Read more
Image
 July 31st: Awoke to a clear sky and we set off on our Lake Eyre flight, which was actually 5 hours of flying with a stopover at Birdsville for lunch. Seeing Lake Eyre North filled with water was one thing, but travelling over the Channel country where the Diamantina River and Coopers Creek, both in flood break up into a myriad of channels such that there is water from one horizon to the other, was truly spectacular! Coopers Creek has only just reached Lake Eyre. There is only local rain causing a little bit of filling only for south Lake Eyre, but there is no water yet going through the Goyder channel connecting the two halves of the Lake.We ate at the Birdsville Hotel then went to Birddvisitors centre to learn more about the Lake Eyre Basin. On the way back we saw Goyder lagoon which was a huge area of water. We also saw the Birdsville track flooded and it was easy to see way it is closed and will be for some time. We didn’t see as many birds as I thought we might. We saw pelican...
Read more
Image
 5th January: Nic’s 75th birthday! We had an early start to meet Laurie the owner of Tyrepower at 9am. He changed over our damaged tyre for our spare without difficulty and gave me 2 spare wheel nuts to have on hand. He gave us more info re tyre pressures- his advice- keep them up! He also chatted to us about life in Derby! He charged us only $50 cash of course!  We then went to Norval Art Gallery to meet Jill and Craig for coffee and cake. Nic got a lovely video of Frances wishing Nic Happy birthday Pop, plus a lovely phone call from Anna and his sister Sally.  Mary and Mark Norval set up this Gallery in 2012 as a vehicle for local indigenous artists to display their work particularly Wandjina paintings, and to display Mark’s own work. It also a museum for historically carved Boab nuts with many for sale. I bought some beautifully carved Boab nuts plus a Wandjina painting set in Manning gorge where we swam so recently we had a long chat with Mark, originally from Canberr...
Read more