12/10/11 White Cliffs To Cobar

After we left White Cliffs within 30 km we saw 5 black bearded lizards warming themselves on or beside the road, and then we gave up counting. 

We saw a number of emus and adult emus with juvenile chicks however, the animal that just astounded us in regard to their numbers along the road side were goats. There were hundreds of them!  Their coats varied from white, to brindle, to jet black. While we saw lots of road kill -  emus and kangaroos and even several pigs  - we did not see any evidence of goats having been run over.

11/10/11 Peery Lake, Paroo - Darling National Park

We travelled 53 km to Peery Lake in the Paroo - Darling National Park. The lake is an interesting ochre colour due to the sediment dissolved in it.  Now that the lake has filled it will hold water for about three years. Water birds are finding a new playground.

We saw several beautifully coloured small lizards.

As we travelled a number of emus crossed our path or ran away as we went by. When they run they bob up and down and they look like a huge feather duster with legs.

On the way back to White Cliffs we saw one very large, and one small, black bearded lizard. We stopped to say:  "Hello! Can we take your photograph?"  They put up their spikes and tried to look very fierce. They did not take their eyes off the camera.  

10/10/11 White Cliffs

White Cliffs has a population of 200.  It looks like an area of gigantic ant hills.  We spent the day fossicking on the claim being worked by our friend Hayley and her husband Brad. We found some small chips and enough potch to show back home that we have been out on the field.  Brad showed us down his mine and some opal he had found.  Thank you for inviting us to a delicious evening meal!

White Cliffs has a small solar power station which supplies some of the power needs of the town.

Around the outskirts of the town are patches of beautiful noxious weeds.

9/10/11 Broken Hill To White Cliffs via Wilcania

The most exciting moments on the trip were when we spotted a very large, fat stumpy tail lizard and we stopped to photograph it.

8/10/11 Broken Hill / Silverton

We went to church and stayed for the fellowship lunch.   It was great to catch up with friends and acquaintances from my year in Broken Hill - 1963!  In the afternoon we went for another drive to Silverton.  It was an animal filled afternoon.  We saw camels, lots of goats, kangaroos, lizards and donkeys. A stumpy -tail lizard was the fattest one that we have encountered.  Gerd got prickled by the bearded dragon lizard when he went to pick it up.  The donkeys were wandering down the main street of Silverton and came overt peer into the car.  I think that they wanted some bread, but we didn't have any with us.

7/10/11 Broken Hill - Silverton

Silverton is where the "Mad Max" films, starring Mel Gibson, were made.  It flourished during the railway / mining heydays but now has only a pub, some art studios and a small number of local residents homes  and some historic old buildings in various stages of disrepair.

The overflow water from the Umberumberka Reservoir during last big rains has carved out the river banks and left heaps of stones along the river bed.  

6/10/11 From Port Augusta to Broken Hill

We decided that inland might be drier than the coast, so we set off for Broken Hill.  On the way we stopped to see the giant gum tree at the southern entrance to Orroroo.  It is 10.89 metres in circumference.

We liked the new street decoration in Orroroo, depicting horses pulling a plough, and commemorating the pioneer farmers .

Along the road side we saw many emus.

4th to 5/10/11 Port Augusta

We tried to escape the windy, damp weather by travelling to Port Augusta. We left the wind behind but the dampness  came with us, only clearing for a little while in the late afternoon.  It was a good day to hire a couple of videos and stay indoors.

3/10/11 Murphy's Haystack, Talia Caves and Venus Bay

Murphy's Haystacks are pink granite inselbergs.  Local legend says that a Scottish agricultural expert passing by in the mail coach said:  "That farmer must harrow, look at all the hay he has saved."

Talia caves are a geological wonder.  The Woolshed is a long cave hollowed out by wave and wind action  into the cliff face.  Gerd's hat blew off his head into the channel.  He wanted to strip off and jump in and retrieve it and had to be verbally restrained!

The Tub at Talia Caves is a spectacular sink hole.  At high tide the sea whooshes up the cliff face and enters the bottom of the Tub through a large washed-out arch.

In the afternoon the weather changed and it started to rain. We drove to Venus Bay and gazed down  from the top of the dangerous, broken and undercut cliffs at some dolphins.  

2/10/11 Point Labatt near Streaky Bay

Point Labatt, south of Streaky Bay, is a sea lion colony.  You can stand on the cliff above the colony and watch them lolling on the rocks far below.

Today, as we travelled we saw 27 stumpy tail lizards crossing our track.  We got out of the car and had a close encounter of the camera kind with most of them.  They tried to put on their most aggressive face and hissed loudly to frighten these interfering humans away.  

There was a noticeable difference in colour between what we assume were the male and female lizards.  The males were much blacker and the females were more green and yellow like the surrounding countryside.

We also saw a small ornate dragon which dug itself into the sand to hide from the terrifying camera lens . That was the first time we had observed this behaviour.

At the end of the day, because we had bright sunshine, we returned to The Granites on the Westall Way Loop to take some extra photos of the rocks with their orange-red lichen colouring.

1/10/11 Westall Way Loop near Streaky Bay

We drove around the Westall Way Loop, near Streaky Bay.  The coastline varied from gigantic sand hills and  sandy bays,  to broken rocky edges eaten by rolling waves, to high cliffs beaten by the enormous swells which break at their base.  In some areas the southern facing granite rocks were decorated with orange-red lichen.  It was a dull day until late in the afternoon when the sun finally broke through and added some sparkle to the scenery.