Thursday, October 11th - Bronte and Palapah

Another long day of driving for Barb - but she seems to be used to it. We loaded up on groceries and hit the road. Once again we stopped along the way at a bakery for lunch - Barb seems to be able to find a bakery wherever she goes!

Most of the trip was on paved roads. Alongside the roads are "agistment" lands. These are areas where one can take animals to graze if your property doesn't have enough feed. The government has dug ground tanks every so often so that there is water for the animals. It was strange to see animals wandering alongside the highway - no fences to keep them off the roads - between the sheep, cattle and kangaroos, drivers have to be alert.

As we drove along, we had a chance to get a good look at the countryside. It's very flat, very few houses seen from the highway, very dry - but it wasn't as bare as I thought it might be. There are a fair amount of trees and bushes - and the type and amount of vegetation changes frequently, so it isn't boring - just kind of lonely.

We stopped at Barb and David's new place - Bronte - which is just a short drive along a dirt road off the highway. Barb showed us through the house - which has definite potential - but loads of hard work ahead of them to get it fixed up the way they want it. The house is surprisingly roomy - good sized rooms - and I think about 5 bedrooms - one of which will end up being Barb's studio. It's a good sized room and she has already set up a bookshelf for her folk art books, etc. Some of the rooms are going to be gutted and completely redone, others basically just need painting and new carpeting. She has planted a couple of small trees inside the fenceline for the homestead, and they seem to be doing okay - one is a maple! She gave them all a watering while we were there. There are a fair amount of trees in the area of the homestead, and Barb told us about her plans for gardens, etc. Like I said, there's a lot of hard work ahead of them, but it doesn't all need to be done at once. First priority is to install the new poly water tanks for the house and for the stock. Apparently there is good underground water on Bronte - and they have plans to put down a new bore - then they will not need to rely on the ground tanks and be able to pump water to the poly tanks as needed.

Off we went again - to the thriving metropolis of Ivanhoe - I don't know what the population is - but it's a very small town, but the closes town to Palapah approximately 45 kms away. Quite a way to drive if you need a loaf of bread! After Ivanhoe we turned off the paved road onto a dirt road which we followed for 35+ kms until we came to the laneway into Palapah - about 5 kms. Everything in this area is measured in kms. not feet or inches (grin). All the properties are very large.

David fired up the bbq, Barb tossed together some potatoes, onions and mushrooms, and David cooked them on the bbq along with some lamb chops and sausages. David does his own butchering and makes his own sausages. It was a yummy meal, put together in a minimum of time.