A beautiful day today which maxed out at 29 degrees up in the mountains.
Our first task was to visit the tourist information centre to see what was going on in the area. In the centre was a display of local handiwork and paintings. The embroidery was something to see, as the pictures will confirm.
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| 291014 Bouquet - a cross stitched embroidery - took 5 years to do |
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| 291014 Another embroided picture - this took 6 months to do |
Not wishing to miss a chance to see the local gorges, we headed off to Telowie Gorge, only to find that it was closed as a result of bush fires and floods earlier this year. Undaunted, we headed for Bangor Gorge, through which you have to pass to get to the tableland in the ranges. It too had been ravaged by the same bush fires and floods. The road along the bottom of the gorge was badly damaged by the flood and has only recently been repaired and reopened. It was a twisty, turny drive for about 15km but eventually we emerged at Murray Town.
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| 291014 Bangor Gorge - bushfire and flood ravaged summer 2014 |
By now we were in the grain fields with barley and wheat crops everywhere, with an occasional patch of black, where faba beans had been sprayed in preparation for harvesting.
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| 291014 Faba bean crop after spraying and ready for harvesting |
We passed through these as we headed for Melrose, a lovely town at the base of Mount Remarkable. Melrose has an ANZAC memorial on the slopes of Mount Remarkable, and the view of the fields of gold from this site was magnificent. The amount of land devoted to cereal crops is quite astonishing.
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| 291014 Mount Remarkable - southern Flinders Ranges |
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| 291014 Coming in to Melrose. Note the roses |
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| 291014 ANZAC memorial in Melrose |
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291014 Melrose from the ANZAC Memorial site on the lower
slopes of Mount Remarkable |
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291014 View from the ANZAC Memorial site on the lower
slopes of Mount Remarkable |
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| 291014 The old suspension bridge at Melrose |
We came face to face with a farmer whose son was harvesting wheat near to where we had stopped, not far from Pekina. He was a wealth of knowledge about cereal crop farming and explained what was happening with the machinery. We barely got away from him when another farmer pulled up alongside and was on for a chat too.
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| 291014 Harvesting wheat near Pekina |
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| 291014 Emptying the "box" of grain on the combine harvester |
From Pekina we drove by many, many more farms down through Tarcowie to Jamestown and then turned west and headed back to Port Pirie via Caltowie, and Gladstone.
Today we covered 264km. Each day we find and enjoy something new which adds to our learning experience. Today was no exception and we even saw some colour other than gold.
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| 291014 Briar type rose on the roadside near Melrose |
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| 291014 Don't think they are weeds. They were in well defined fields |
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