Rest time in Orroroo

We had intended to spend the last few days in Quorn, as we were interested in completing one of the history walks.   However, when we rang the campsite, they had a party of school children staying there, and were unable to accommodate campers.   

After a quick look at the map we decided on Orroroo, a name made up of the letters o and r, which was further east,  and on a road called R.M. Williams Way.   This road runs between the Flinders Ranges Way and Clare, with the starting point just below Hawker.   

Off we went, past the campsite at Woomera, where we stayed on the way back from Coober Pedy.   The place that closed the barbeque area, due to Covid-19, but kept the bar open, and where we got into trouble for driving over the barriers that separated sites.   

After lunch at Pimba, we drove down the Stuart Highway, past Port Augusta, over the range of hills towards Wilmington, and finally took the road east to Orroroo.

And at Orroroo we found a delightful caravan park, privately owned, and therefore not part of a chain.   The place was friendly, with lovely facilities, some of which were shared with the local golf course.

The people in the small prosperous town were even friendlier, and we drank coffee at both cafes, and dinner at one of the pubs.   Plus spent quite a bit of money in the local butchers shop, where I bought normal meat, no sustainable or feral platters for me.   

We were tempted, for a couple of minutes, to buy a four bedroomed cottage, with stables, for $90,000.   We of course do not have $90,000 to spare, for one thing, nor do we, or our family, want to come up to Orroroo to spend every vacation.    We saw reason very quickly.   But the houses in the town were old, well maintained, and cheap.   Unfortunately I did not take any photographs of the delightful old houses, mostly built of sandstone.

There was a creek running through the valley below the town, with aboriginal carvings on a face rock.   The rock had a cage around it so it was impossible to take photographs.   A delightful walk.

As it was early spring, there was green grass everywhere, and Piper loved running around in it.    And I took her down to the golf course every morning for her early morning walk and ball play.   I could see that once summer arrived the grass would turn brown, the greens on the course were made of a soft bitumen.   No watering needed there.

The main street of Orroroo, which in fact had vehicles parked during the day.   I must have caught the town at a very quiet time.

The local town hall.   Very imposing.

Coffee time.   The buildings that lined the well kept street of shops, with buildings dating back to the 1870s.

                                                    

A photograph below of the pub where we did not have dinner.   It was difficult to choose which pub to go to,  so we went to the one where the owners also cooked and served the meals, as against the other one which was run by a manager.   However, there was a long wait for dinner.   And I cannot remember what I ordered either, so must have been acceptable.

                                        

We drove to Peterborough, not to be confused with Peterborough in the UK.  Our Peterborough was established in 1875, and was called Petersburg initially, but there was a name change in 1917 due to the perceived connection with Germany.  It became the intersection for the trains running south to Adelaide, west to Broken Hill, east to Port Pirie, and north to Quorn and then Alice Springs.   It is still possible to see the three railway gauges here: broad, standard and narrow.   T

There were also very large railway workshops situated here, and currently these are used as a museum.   

All rail services stopped in the 1980s, although tourist trains continued until 2002.     The signpost and part of the long platform at Peterborough.

The town had received funding to renovate buildings and verandahs, and it all looks very smart, but sadly due to the lack of overseas and interstate tourists, there were few people on the streets.

The owner of the caravan park at Orroroo informed us that there was a huge drug problem in Peterborough, namely crystal meth (methamphetamine).   Or its common name of Ice.   Unexpected, or perhaps not, as it is a problem drug in South Australia.  

Finally a photograph of Walter, standing in front of a giant gum tree.   No point trying to hug this tree.

We packed up reluctantly, drank our last coffee, and left to drive home to Aldinga Beach, 324 km away.

Now this should be the end of the tale, except Walter left his bag at the cafe, and we did not realise until we reached Clare, 138 km from Orroroo.   

I cannot point my finger at Walter for being careless, as I once left my handbag, which included my two passports, telephone, money, cards, in fact my whole life, in a taxi which we had stepped out of,  at Changi Airport.   And we were about to fly to Australia.   Now that was scary.  I got my handbag back luckily, due to Walter ringing my telephone, which alerted the taxi driver.   But we spent fifteen minutes in sheer panic initially.   So Walter leaving his bag at the cafe was nothing compared to my handbag incident.   

We retraced our steps (driving of course) and arrived back at the cafe in time for lunch.   Now I know we thought Orroroo was very special and I had had my eye on the pies at this particular cafe when we left at 10 o'clock.  But it was a long journey just to enjoy the pies that we could not have at coffee time.   They were delicious!    There is always a silver lining in every mistake.

Altogether a fantastic eleven day journey through outback Australia.