Our Home for Six Months

For those who have been curious about our new home for the six months we are living at the Station, here are some photo's. 

On arriving we were very surprised at the spaciousness of the house, having not seen any photos of this property. Families from other properties had sent photos of the accommodation they provided and we had been prepared for almost anything. Often this would be donga's.

But we are blessed with spacious newly furnished accommodation. Half of the house is the schoolrooms and the other half, ours, has an open lounge, dining, kitchen and a main bedroom with walk-in and ensuite, and an internal laundry.

The area above is to eventually be a grassed area for the children to use during school time. Each house on the property, in the home area, has a yard with watered lawns.

Below are some photos of the interior of the house, which came fully equipped and furnished. 

As we unpacked our coaster bus, which is now our home, it was amazing how well set up it is. A few on the station asked where the ' stuff ' kept coming from. The bus had almost all the little extras we would need. 

Ps I even brought my sewing machine and rag quilting materials, and already have a lap quilt and bag on the way !

 

Finally, the beautiful view from our windows each night before we go to dinner.

Posted by Lynne

Our First Teaching Week - What Else Could Go Wrong ?

We have spent our first week and a half settling in and learning the ropes. The first few days  here on my own were spent clearing through the schoolroom cupboards and sorting resources till late at night, re-organising display walls, attempting to organise a timetable and teaching. 

Our timetable is full on, from 8am to 3.30pm, as we work around up to 7 on-air sessions a day, our teaching sessions, and smoko and lunch which are all cooked and ready for us when we arrive. It's very important to be on time! So I have set my iPod to make interesting noises at every change ... It barks, sounds alarms, goes boing, plays the marimba and sings at us. The boys are getting good at knowing which sound is for what ! (dinner is also provided for us, so no cooking)

Our first few teaching days went well if you don't think about anything to do with communications ! The boys had trouble logging in to SODE (School of The Air) and the main computer went down. Then the laptop had to be used for lessons which meant only one child at a time for on air lessons and no other videos, tutorials, or teaching tools could be accessed on line for the other boys. The headsets with phone wouldn't work so the poor boys had to hold phone to ear while working. But amazingly we all had a good first few days? Usually up until lunch time we may have one of the boys accessing an on -air lesson while we teach the other two. This teaching time could include accessing short videos or tutorials of up to about 5 minutes, or teaching tools online or discs. Our youngest boy is doing Prep/Kinder so he may watch and listen to interactive videos with rhymes, songs or letter and number recognition activities.  By Thursday we had sussed out all the problems  and corrected them and it was much better .... but now ! !  there are no on-air lessons for a week and a half while children from outlying stations take it in turns to head in for cluster meets for a day  at regional towns. Our closest is Windorah, about 5 and a half hours away.

Our learning time is very full on but we have spent the last half hour or so of our days shooting baskets, making African habitats in the sandpit, making and investigating the  properties of gloop, making lemonade in our kitchen, stretching our minds with tricky games, showing us around part of their 8,910 square km back yard, and getting to know each other.

Overall it has been a good week !

Posted by Lynne

George's Drive Out in the Bus

George finally left Thargomindah for Durham Downs Station on the Friday towards lunchtime, 4 days later than expected. The trip was a good one and our 1984 coaster handled the drive in well,    

 with very little dust finding its way inside. George had taped a few vents, floor hatches and inlet holes  and we were surprised at the way she travelled.

The Station is north west of Thargomindah, and he travelled along the road towards Innaminka before turning north past the Bellara Gas Centre site. This natural gas field is situated on Durham Down's land, along with other gas and oil fields. Workers off the station head to Innaminka sometimes on the weekends, so we will take a weekend and head off there and to the Burke and Will's Dig Tree sometime.

Posted by Lynne

Thargomindah to Durham Downs Station - Not What we Expected !!

We left Thargomindah on the Sunday morning, 6th of July, heading for an overnight stop at Noccundra by the river, ready to head into Durham Downs Station on Monday ! We were keen to be finally on our way on the final leg of our journey and took photos of the mileage signs as we left town.

We drove about 20 kms up the road and George began to pull off, something wasn't right. We'd blown a tyre and on inspection he discovered we'd also lost a wheel nut. He decided we'd turn back and have both fixed in Thargomindah before we moved on. This was the beginning of another long week !

We were going to have to wait till Monday for the Toyota dealer to open ... yes there was one here, but we didn't expect them to have what we needed. So we rang ahead to the Station... at least we still had Telstra service !

I was picked up by the station cook, Kim, in the station 4wd ute on Tuesday afternoon and arrived at Durham Downs Station ready to begin work on my own ! George was left to wait !

Long story short ... Tyre was to come on Wednesday's truck and the wheel nut on Thursday's. The tyre arrived but it took the mechanic 2 days to get to it, and the wheel nut was ' lost ' in transit. By Friday lunch George decided, after meeting a retired diesel mechanic at the caravan park, to risk the drive out so we could have the weekend to unpack and organise our new home.

We  are still to receive our missing wheel nut !!

Posted by Lynne

Cunnamulla to Thargomindah

Before leaving Cunamulla we decided to go to the Cunamulla Fella Centre and view the sculpture. George was very interested because it is a country song he has sung in the past and he always likes a bit of background knowledge. He was very impressed with the sculpture itself.

 At Thargomindah, the last town before heading in to the Station, we stopped at another caravan park where once more George was asked to sing in the evening. We've discovered its a great way to get a free nights stopover. The next morning we decided to stay on and George once more sang for our fees. The pictures below are from Thargomindah.

Above: Believe it or not this town had the first Hydro electric powered street lighting in Australia, third in the world after London and Paris in 1893. They have a working display with a hydro powered generator.

 Above is the towns River Walk which follows the Bulloo River and leads down to the Cobb and Co river crossing. The drought has effected the river's flow and it is more a series of interconnected ponds at the moment. Since leaving Dubbo this has been the norm.

A very busy Saturday in the Main Street of Thargomindah !

Posted By Lynne

Our New Adventure Begins

Our new adventure began with our daughters giving us a surprise going away dinner and supper with close friends. One of our best mates and old travel companions, Wayne, made us a going away cake  with the words, " The start of the big adventure !"

On the second day after overnighting in a free stopover at Berry Park in Bathurst, which we can recommend, we began our travel through the diverse country of western NSW. From the green hills of the central west around Orange to the flat plains from Dubbo to Bourke, where the soil soon changed to the red dirt we remember. Around Narromine we found the cotton crops had already been brought in and baled ready for transport.

Thursday morning arrived and found us woken early in a free stopover, the Teamsters Rest in Nyngan, first by a shunt train at 4am, then the street sweepers at 6am. So giving up on sleep we made an early start towards Burke and eventually Cunnamulla. The following photos were taken in one of those small towns which is slowly dying, Girilambone out of Nyngan. The house is gracefully vacant and derelict, the shop is closed and up for sale.

We are now resting in a park in Cunnamulla, where I think I will use my Amaysim/Optus phone for the last time before losing service and changing it across to a low use package (prepaid). We will rely on family calling in for the next couple of nights and our Telstra 4g internet.

Posted by Lynne

Planning for a trip like this ??

We have been asked, "what type of planning we have done to prepare for a trip like this ? "
So I'll try to answer.

We have had our bus for 8 years now, and have done outback trips quite a few times over the last 22 years, including places like Broken Hill, Muttawingi NP, White Cliffs, Bourke to Wanaaring to Tibooburra along the Dingo Fence, and Cameron's Corner, Central Australia, Coober Pedy, Mt Isa, Flinders Ranges to name a few. But taking the bus on this type of dirt road was a little daunting, perhaps we've no reason to feel this way but it's always better to be safe than sorry.
So the bus was our first concern. We had cover plates already on our 2 water tanks but no bash plate protecting the radiator and front of bus, so the fabricating of this was first priority along with full major service and a few spare parts bought to carry with us.

Next was our communications. With not even Telstra service for quite a distance from the Station we needed our old UHF updated and purchased a 7 db gain aerial and bought same for phone. We changed one of our Amaysim phones for a chunky blue tick tradies phone which is water and dust resistant, and switched to Telstra. As we have no phone service at Station both phones have been changed to low usage for 6 months, and my Amaysim one can be easily switched back and forth when we come into town. We also bought a Telstra 4g Wifi for internet with 12 month usage.

Next concern was medical, as if we get sick there is the medical kit at station and the Flying Dr. As I was sick before we left we are traveling with our own medical kit (antibiotics, steroids etc) and I have a health plan and asthma alert plan. We have pre purchased all our medicines and carry repeat scripts and letters to alternate doctors.

 Our poor bus, without our trailer, is chock a block with a teaching box of favorite equipment, and others with new books, craft, stickers, rewards etc. then there's personal supplies of toiletries and
some favorite foods.

We've also organised prepayment of bus registration etc and set up bank accounts to pay bills automatically.

Hopefully this answers some of people's questions about our remote adventure. If  you have any more queries please message us in the comment box in the right hand column. If you'd like to say hello comment there too !!
What a long post !

Posted by Lynne :)