Coober Pedy, SA.

 All refreshed, we set off with the South Australian border in our sights. We crossed the border with ease that day and drove past Marla and found a nice free camp off the road. It looked like a great camp spot - but after we were set up and Saul went for a walk and found that it was home to some reptiles. Thankfully we never saw the reptiles to know if they had legs or not. It was also the place with the biggest prickles with the most spikes that we have encountered so far on our trip.

The next day we kept heading south and stopped at Coober Pedy to fuel up and restock. We stopped at Faye's Underground house and took the tour with the current resident, Grant. Unfortunately we could only tour the house and not the mine, because Grant was the only person home that day. Faye was a very impressive women and dug the house by hand with her 2 girlfriends, and they later only used mechancial tools when they were available for extending the house. They also dug an inground pool by hand, which was the first inground pool ever in Coober Pedy. She become very rich from the opal mine on her property and opened the house for tourists quite early on. Later in life she moved home to QLD where she purchased a pub and stayed there until she passed away only a few years ago. The house and mine is now lived in by the new owners and still runs tours of the mine and the house, with most of the original items still in the house. It is like walking into a 1970's time capsule. 



From here we kept driving, and had lunch at a rest stop along the road. We were aiming to get to a free camp below Pimba overlooking the salt lakes, however the weather turned miserable and the wind was very strong, so we stopped at the Pimba road house for the night to wait about the storm. It was extremely windy and there was lots of rain so we were glad to were not camped at an exposed lookout for the night. The kids enjoyed watching the road trains pull in the roadhouse, especially at night time when they had lots and lots of lights on.


The next day, we woke up and the storm had cleared, but it was still cloudy and windy and the coldest day we have experienced for many months. We kept heading south and had a little drive around Port Augusta again just for old times sake. The new bridge has had a little bit of progress since we drove through 6 months ago.


We had to wait for one of Port Augusta's famous long freight trains when we were crossing the road, and then just out of town we caught up to it and travelled along side it for a little while. We all enjoyed this little bit of fun. We took video of this but no photos, so have a look on social media if you can.

We then stopped at Port Pirie to refuel and restock again - the most exciting thing being that now we are in South Australia the Woolies have the lego packs available. They were sold out in the NT and we couldn't get a floor or walls. The kids are so excited and are making a new supermarket set up every day. (Photos by Zara and Elsie!)


We enjoyed lunch by the Flinders View Park - a nice view and a pretty garden. Then we kept driving south and watched the weather turn colder and colder!! It sounds silly but we are glad to be back in the cool weather, the heat and humidity took it's toll on us. It is also comforting to now be seeing some familiar landscapes, and it is starting to feel like home again.


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