SATURDAY 9 DECEMBER   NUNDROO TO PETERBOROUGH   790kms

My watch and the little van clock were set on SA time, but our body clocks were not. So it felt like an unreasonably early start, even though it wasn’t.

The day was a little cooler – just a little.

Went through the quarantine checkpoint west of Ceduna. I had calculated the fruit and veg stocks bought back in Newman, so we did not have anything to throw out.

Topped up fuel at Ceduna – $1.27cpl; Kimba – $1.30 cpl; and Port Augusta – $1.20 cpl.

This was the fourth time we had driven across the Nullarbor, so it all did feel a bit routine.

At Port Augusta, parked near the Woolworths store and bought some fresh supplies, and newspapers. We were appreciative of the large parking area beside the waterfront, where it was easy enough to park a vehicle and van.

The idea of staying in Port Augusta – yet again – was not appealing – given some not so pleasant memories of being stranded there for nearly a week in 1993 with a broken axle on our Hilux of the time. So we pushed on, through the winding Horrocks Pass route, to the rolling plains beyond. I always enjoyed the drive through the Horrocks Pass – bendy  though it was. Just found it interesting. In places, one could see that the road foundation edging, beside steep little roadside gutters, was of brick.

At the top of the pass, the vista was of the rolling sheep and grain country of the mid north west of SA.

Peterborough beckoned – like normal civilization again. We took a powered site at the very pleasant caravan park there. $20 for the night. We were able to stay hitched up.

Trees! Shade! TV!

I enjoyed reading the weekend papers. Could feel myself transitioning back to something like our real world.