This is The Finke River, we had never seen it this wet before!

...and this is us on the dry bit

(well, we are Whippets) onto

a really good smell!

Monday 30.08.2010 - Heading further South.

Our next stop was at Lake Hart where we have stopped before just for short breaks, this time though we got there in the early afternoon and having shared a spot of lunch we all rugged up and went off for a long walk on the Lake edge, it was wonderful, so many smells, so many things to roll in, so much space for really big Whippet Wizzies! We walked for about 2 and a half hours or so and we all want to go back and do a day hike there on our way South next year.

Before we started our walk we checked with the people in the big caravan and made sure someone else was going to be staying the night so it did not matter that we were gone so long. When we got back Annie made us wash behind our ears 'coz we had rolled in so much smelly stuff - that was a bit of a downer, people are funny they put smelly stuff behind their ears and on their wrists then they get upset when we dogs do the same sort of thing....have not worked that one out yet.

The next morning we rove in some very strong winds down to Pt Augusta, we fuelled up, had morning tea, did some dinner shopping, and Annie went to see the man in the 4WD garage close to where we parked to see if he knew where there might be a caravan repair place as we had noticed a strip across the front of the roof was lifting off, we had also heard the weather report and it was going to be very wet and very windy in the days ahead.

The nice man, who incidentally made a great fuss of Connor and I as he has friends with Whippets, said he could fix the roof for us. So Annie took us for a ramble around Pt Augusta and when we got back to the 4WD shop it was all fixed, new weather strip,sealed underneath all the way along and new screws that are longer than the original ones - all for the princely sum of $50.00 cash. Annie thanked the nice man very profusely as she had been expecting about $200.00 or so.

We drove out of town and decided to splash out on a CP for the night, staying at Port Germain, where we could empty our toilet in the morning and fill up the water tanks too.

Got to have another rather nice trot around before bed with the promise of a big run in the morning.

Some sharing type fisho's gave Annie some fresh fish for tea so that was rather good as she is a sharing type special person!

In the morning we had a long run out to the end of the jetty and back, then we went and did our household chores before heading off. We drove down to the footy oval at Mallalla where one can camp for free, expecting to have a nice quiet night, little did we know that it had been The Balaclava Cup that day and there was a big dinner on at the Club rooms! Never mind we were right over the other side in the designated camp spot.

Wednesday 1st September

Wet and Windy, still we could not stay at the football grounds all day, so we ventured off to Gawler first, when we got there it had stopped raining so we got to enjoy a good walk at one of the 2 great parks in Gawler, then we went off in search of a nice spot for morning coffee but because of the weather Connor and I got left in the H.on.W, none of the places with outside seating were sheltered enough!

After this we stopped off at an enormous shopping centre for Annie to get a couple of items, she cam out and found we had a flat battery-lucky for us the SA version of the AANT man came out and fixed it for us so we then headed in to Adelaide. The Royal Adelaide Show was starting on Friday, which was also Whippet day. We know from previous visits that if you want to be in Adelaide early am the choice is to get up and into town before the sparrows get up to beat the traffic or (much better option) go in the night before and park in one of 2-3 quite legal parking areas where, as long as one does not look as though one is camping and one is self contained, one can park overnight.

Thursday was spent going to the Adelaide markets where we got food that would make even Timmy and Skye's mouths water, going to the Charm Shop to get a Whippet charm but they did not have any, having coffee out at a lovely place on Hutt Street that welcomes customers with 4 paws, and just lounging in our H.on.W reading and listening to music...quite a pleasant way to spend the day, in the late afternoon between rain showers we had a great run on what used to be Victoria Park Race Course where we met a few of the locals, Connor and I always like meeting and greeting.

The day of the show was actually the worst yet, a really big storm like we have in Darwin, but COLD, lots of thunder and lightening too. Annie went off to the show and got drenched right through all her clothes so the poor thing came back coughing and spluttering all over the place, we spent the rest of the day trying to get her warm again.

The Saturday was not much better but we did get to go and visit a few friends in the suburbs, by Sunday the worst of the weather had passed over and Annie made the decision to take me to the OT at Port Adelaide, I was not going too badly until the 2 stewards came running into the ring as they had missed their cue to take up their positions for my Figure 8, they had big warm coats on and to tell the truth scared me, after that I went to pieces.

After our part in the trial was over we drove out of Adelaide and got down to Keith CP for the night, bit more expensive than what Annie usually pays but we had just had 4 free nights so hang the expense! There was a laundry, really good showers, water and dump point here so all was at hand, which made it better value than at first it seemed.