Onwards and Upwards

After Adelaide, we headed north and slightly west up the Stuart Highway through Port Augusta, the "Crossroads of Australia". There was a roadsign there that had an arrow pointing west that read 'Perth and Western Australia', and an arrow pointing north that read 'Darwin and Northern Territory'. So we headed north. This is where the real desert and outback begin, the roads were straight and level, although what appeared to be a flat landscape wass actually more undulating than we thought, as we drove through some hillier areas. Someone had said that they planned this road to traverse the more interesting parts of the country, to keep the drivers occupied. One thing we also noticed is that almost everyone we passed waved, and this happened all through this part of South Australia and into the Northern Territory, with bigger greetings among the Britz caravan drivers! The landscape varied more that I thought it would for a semi-desert, with some areas having more low vegetation that others, and many large, flat salt-pan lakes.
We took a detour into Woomera, about halfway up to Coober Pedy, and 8 km off the highway. The roadhouse on the highway at Pimba (petrol prices had been creeping up and it was $1.89 per litre here!) was just like out of a movie - low ceilings, a long bar across the back and the walls were covered with licence plates from mostly Australia, but there was one patch of international plates, including a couple from Ontario.


To get back to Woomera, it is in a former prohibited area, and I will quote the tourist brochure: "The Woomera Prohibited Area is the largest land-based missile and rocket range in the Western world... with firing ranges (mapped out) in 1947. Initially a joint project between Britain and Australia, the site continues to host a raft of space activites. NASA operated a deep space tracking station at Island Lagoon (near Woomera)..." So that is its history. It was a very quiet, bleak place with not too many people around. We continued on our way...