We were going to head down the Oodnadatta Track from Marla as we wanted to go to Lake Eyre. However, the track was closed due to even more rain.
The bank account was going down, so Jarrad quickly found a job at Roxby Downs and phoned through to apply. The next day we spent walking around Port Augusta as Jarrad had an interview, and then headed out to Quorn for the night on the edge of the Flinders Rangers. We didn’t get to look around, though, as Jarrad needed to go into Port Augusta again for work.
We headed down to Port Parham over the weekend so we could be in Adelaide on Monday as Jarrad needed to licence himself in South Australia to work there. Port Parham had a beautiful foreshore camp ground that was packed with campervans and motorhomes, many of whom were indulging in the crabbing that the town was renowned for. Again, the kids rode bikes up and down the camp ground, but due to three snake sightings in the previous few days they were not allowed to go far or to separate.
We had to drive up past Port Augusta, and past Woomera to reach Roxby Downs. It is a town of 5000 people; purpose built during the 1980s for the BHP Billiton Olympic Dam mine. The houses are neat and tidy, though rather compact. The average age in the town is 29, with over a third of the population being under 15. This meant quite a lot of activities in town for kids, and it seemed that most of the town was the traditional nuclear family with mum staying at home with numerous kids while Jarrad went off to work. Only in this town, Jarrad’s work hours were usually long, and could be night or day and weekends were only observed by the retailers and schools.
Royal Flying Doctors
We had only been there a week when we needed to test out the ability of the town’s medical facilities to cope with a childhood accident. Susan tumbled off her bicycle head first. The details are sketchy as she can’t remember falling. Much of her skin from her lips, cheek, hands, belly and knees was grazed off, and a toe nail was torn off. Much more troubling though was the tennis ball sized bruise on her forehead. The helmet had fared worse and had separated into three pieces. Peter was sent to the gates of the campervan park to meet the ambulance I called, but the ambulance reached there before Peter did.
Susan reported a headache and nausea still the next night so we returned to the hospital. She’d slept most of the day and was very grumpy. Susan and Peter both usually read for five or more hours each day, but Susan wasn’t reading because she said her eyes were blurry and it gave her a headache. The sole doctor decided that she should go to Adelaide for precautionary investigations.
The Royal Flying Doctors came out to pick up Susan at 11.30 that night. Susan says she doesn’t remember that, but Mum remembers feeling rather worried about getting on to such a small plane. It was even more worrying when the pilot asked for some latex gloves to make a small repair as we were flying. Luckily the CT scans and x-rays the next day at the Adelaide Children’s Hospital all came back clear and we were told that she ‘just’ had a concussion.
Susan and I got dinner alone in Adelaide at the Rundle Mall, and then sat by the River Torrens watching Black Swans swim gracefully beneath the water fountain. The next morning we sat at Adelaide Airport at 6.30am ready to board a smallish Qantas plane back out to Olympic Dam.
Lake Eyre South
Two weeks later we drove up a track from Roxby Downs to Bopeechee to reach the Oodnadatta Track. We walked out onto Lake Eyre South, not noticing any water but sinking ankle deep under the thin crust of salt into the mud. We examined emu tracks that had been left by a pair of emus running along the moist lake.
A little further along we reached Curdimurka Siding where the Old Ghan track had gone through when it was first built in 1888 and 1889. Its use as a railway had ceased not long after World War II. We could drive on an old railway bridge. It spanned a shallow river that was rippling with the wind. Birds sat on the river drinking the water and hovering above it in the air.
BHP Fun Day
The town hosted the annual BHP Family Fun Day while we were there. The main street of Roxby Downs was blocked off with massive trucks. A bouncy castle was set up, the ABC’s surfing scientist performed for the children, and a puppet show entertained the children. An ‘archeological’ dig in the sand was set up, and the fire brigade sprayed foam all over the grass for the kids to slip and slide in, before hosing them off with the big hose. Clowns contorted balloons in to balloon animals, road around on unicycles, and walked on stilts. A local school from Andamooka, 30km away, had playdough set up to Edmund’s amusement.
Andamooka School
After that day, I told the kids that they were going to spend a day at Andamooka School. It was a kindergarten to grade 5 school in just one schoolroom, with two young men to teach the twenty-odd kids. Peter and Susan were unimpressed and grumpy at the idea of attending a school, even for a day. Lucy was delighted.
Andamooka was a little like Coober Pedy. It was another opal-mining town, and as such there were mullocks all around. The main street was apparently a dry creek bed, and the town looked a little run down compared to prosperous Roxby Downs. The school shared its grounds with the local swimming pool and library, so the kids went swimming one day a week during school. After school three days a week the school ran a program called “Active AfterSchools” and took the kids swimming for an hour.
Even better, the kids at the school were friendly and included us in their games. The teachers didn’t mind if Susan read during class and playtime as long as she’d finished the work. On only one day Susan forgot her kindle, so the principal took her across to the library to choose some other books to read for the day. Susan was pleased to have a break from the classics for a day to read her way through a few Rainbow Magic fairy books.
It was nearly Christmas, so the school was getting ready for the end-of-year concert with a monster theme. Lucy in particular liked learning the song, “On the first day of Christmas, my true love sent to me, a scientist with a wedgie. On the second day of Christmas, my true sent to me, two zombie doves and a scientist with a wedgie.” The school-kids made a lot of the decorations for the concert, and Peter, Susan, and Lucy helped, too. At the concert, each kid was presented with an achievement medal. Our kids expected to be left out, so they were delighted when they were each presented with a medal engraved with “ Andamooka Primary School 2010 Welcome” followed by the child’s name. It was the nicest kids concert we had ever been to because it was completely centred around the kids.
A few days later, the town had their Christmas pageant and closed off the main street again. Peter, Susan, and Lucy joined in with the Andamooka School float. They all dressed up as monsters, and then clambered aboard the truck that was being used. One of the teachers dressed up as the Purple People Eater and drove the truck full of kids around the circuit of the main street twice while the kids threw wrapped lollies at the crowd, while eating even more. The parade was quite large, with most of the businesses and organisations in the town having a float. Afterwards, our little monsters lined up at the newsagent to get a Christmas present from Santa. Peter got a King Arthur lego kit, Susan got expensive water color pencils, Lucy got a scooter, and Edmund got a blow-up paddling pool and ball.
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