Snapshots: Port Augusta to Renmark

It was weird getting back to familiar territory after so long travelling the unknown. Having spent 2 weeks at Port Augusta in June, it was kind of nice and homey to get back there, and I absolutely love the view of the Flinders Ranges. There's something just captivating about the mountains and the view across the Spencer Gulf to them is beautiful.

On leaving Port Augusta we travelled south to Crystal Brook and then turned east. From there we drove through hundred and hundreds (probably thousands and thousands) of acres of wheat. We have seen so much wheat between the end of the Nullarbor, throughout the Eyre Peninsula and then across this stretch of Australia. It is almost incomprehensible how much land is give to wheat farming, and we didn't even see all of it by far.

On our way to Renmark we stopped at a little town called Burra and I am so glad we did stop there. It is an old town, founded because of a copper mine, and has so many historic stone houses and buildings. There are a couple of interesting gift shops which were good to browse through. It reminded me, quite a bit, of Morpeth near home. We really enjoyed our stop there. And one of the interesting things is the footpaths were covered in gravel, which is obviously spoil from the copper mine, as we kept finding small bits of malachite and azurite in the gravel. These are blue and green stones, which was really very cool. There is quite a bit of history to the town and you can learn more about the mine as well, but we had a long drive ahead of us so we only stopped for a bit of a break. It is the sort of place I would definitely visit again should we ever be driving that way again.

Love the arch entry through the hedge fence

1918

I have fond memories of Renmark as my aunt and uncle lived there and had a dog boarding kennel, called Kramner Kennels, and my aunt bred beagles. I remember visiting them on a couple of occasions, and playing with the beagles. I also remember visiting the Monash Playground, which was incredibly cool when I was a kid. It was full of rides and activities that were all self-powered. There were giant rocking animals, slides, a spinning ride you stood up in and a mini rollercoaster, to name a few.

Monash Playground Now

Monash Playground in the 1980s

Awesome spinning thing

(source: adelaiderememeberwhen.com.au)

Giant rocking animal

(source: youtube)

The rollercoaster

(source: playscapes)

The Murray River is in flood at the moment, and there are large parts of land surrounding the town that are covered in flood water. We had a very hot (high 30s) day driving to Renmark and then only day in town to explore, of course it was raining! Still, we had a look around town, at the foreshore, at the Paddle Steamer PS Industry and of course, we had to go and check out the Monash Playground, even though I knew it was very different to what it was like when I was a child. We also visited the AlmondCo premises. They have a shop where you can taste different flavoured almonds, buy all sorts of almond products and it also has a viewing window where you can watch the packing process. That was pretty cool. I really enjoy learning about how all these things happen and watching the automation of the processing.

PS Industry

Rory trying to turn the steering wheel

The crew galley complete with wood fired stove

Plush's Bend (river has cut road)

Renmark Foreshore

It is nice to be back among trees and grass and riverland after seeing so much desert and arid areas.

Streaky Bay and Surrounds

Streaky Bay is a lovely, sleepy seaside town and the caravan park is right on the water. We only had 1 day/2 nights there and it was blowing a gale for a fair bit of it, so it wasn't particularly pleasant to be outside or at the beach. Regardless, I still liked it as a town and I can see why lots of people love staying there.

Caravan park foreshore and view

One of the most bizarre things about Streaky Bay is that wheat is grown almost to the cliff/beach edge. Coming from where we do in NSW we just aren't used to seeing crops growing that close to the ocean, and certainly not wheat. So you look over all these beautiful pale brown wheat fields to the ocean beyond and it is lovely.

In 1990 a young man caught a Great White Shark on a handline off Streaky Bay, and given that it's not far from there that you can go cage diving with sharks, I wasn't too keen to go in the water. There is a lifesize replica of the Great White on display at the Shell Service Station, so we went to check it out... it is truly a monster. It was over 5m long and weighed 1500kg! Scary as to imagine being in the water with that! There is a netted swimming area near the jetty, and I am guessing that is where most people swim... pretty much no one was in the water more than ankle deep when we were there because the wind was just too unpleasant, or perhaps they knew something we didn't.

Shark replica 

On our first day we did one of the tourist drives and drove out to Whispering Rocks and the Blowholes. The weathered limestone coast makes for some very rugged and interesting views. The Whispering Rocks makes a 'dragon breathing in a cave' type of sound when the waves rush in to a cave (Tilda's description). It was certainly more of a noisy breathing sound than a whistle, as such, but it certainly an interesting phenomenon. The Blowholes weren't blowing when we were there. I don't know if the tide was too low or if the sea just wasn't rough enough/big enough waves, but given that they're a short way from town, it's worth the drive to check them both out (they're next to each other).

Whistling Rocks

The Blowholes lookout

Our second day we drove to Point Labatt to see the sea lion colony. This is definitely worth the 51km (one way) drive. It is the only place on mainland Australia where you can see sea lions and while you are up on a cliff above the colony, with binoculars or a good zoom camera lens, you can see them so well. We got to watch pups feeding and playing about in a rock pool, as well as see all of the ones just lazing about sleeping on the rocks and sand. We were there for half an hour or so before Rory started getting bored and I could have stayed there for hours. It was simply amazing to watch.

We also explored the coastline along the Westall Loop and  the rock pools of Smooth Pool.

One of the many beautiful views along the coastline

One of the rock pools

"Camelot" the public toilet at Scaeles Bay

Kalgoorlie Mining

Kalgoorlie is absolutely a mining town. As you drive in from the south, you see old spoil heaps and exploratory drilling holes and as you approach the town, the Super Pit dominates the landscape. It's a big town, steeped in history since the late 1800s-early 1900s and there are a lot of historic buildings. There are two towns that merge into one – Boulder and Kalgoorlie – and both have historic main streets with lots of interesting buildings. You can do a self guided audio tour of both streets and learn all about the historic buildings but we didn't do that as it's not something we could easily do with the kids. Having said that, there is still lots to do.

Kalgoorlie Super Pit
The Super Pit is the result of a number of smaller mines being bought up and becoming one massive open cut mine. It is impossible to get your head around the sheer immenseness of the Pit, even when you are standing there. Even knowing how massive the trucks are that dig and haul the rock, and the fact that from the lookout at the top of the Pit they look like teeny, tiny toys, it is still impossible to really comprehend just how big the Pit is. We visited the lookout all 3 days were were at Kalgoorlie, as it is really worth just standing there and trying to absorb it all.

Some (most?) days they blast and that is pretty cool. You phone the information hotline around 9:30am and they have a recorded message saying what time blasting is going to happen, if at all. They did blasting on the Wednesday and Thursday we were there. Both times it was scheduled for 1pm, and both times they went early (5 mins and 10 mins) and so we just weren't quite ready with out camera to get a video, much to Greg's disappointment. There is no warning to let you know and on the Wednesday, the trucks were still working, rumbling up and down the massive roads while the blasting occurred. All you see at first is a bit of a lift/disturbance on a patch of ground, then a dust cloud begins billowing up and then you hear a bit of a boom. It is very cool to watch.

The dust is from the blast. I can't get the video to upload

Hannan North Tourist Mine
This is a great little tourist attraction set up to show off how mining used to occur “in the olden days”. There are lots of different buildings to explore, including miners huts, managers office, bank, stores and explosives storage. There is also a lot of different equipment used in mining, from simple ore carts, to different types of drills and different mine shaft headframes.

A rescue pod, that produces oxygen and scrubs CO2 for I think it was 36 hours. I guess they have them at strategic points in the underground mines in case of collapse

The most exciting part for Rory was a modern digger and a modern dumper. You could climb up into the cab of the dumper. The sheer size of these trucks is mind boggling! It was good to get up so close (and into) one of these to get an even better perspective of just how huge the Super Pit really is.

 

There is also a Chinese Rememberance Garden, complete with koi ponds which entertained the children. I don't think either of them have even seen koi before and they were amazed at the size and colours of them.

You could also pan for gold in a little stream. They must seed the water daily with gold, as we all found some little flakes. I can see how gold fever hit so many, as once you find one bit you just really want to keep trying to find more, not because you are greedy but because it is exciting to go through the process of digging the dirt, panning it and seeing that little flake of gold come out of all the mud and mess.