The Great Central Road (cont)

 Monday 19/5/25 Day 3.

Today we drove on to the Warakurna Roadhouse. On the way we stopped for smoko at a roadside stop and Keith and Rhonda got a flat tyre because they had run over, would you believe a broken pair of nail scissors.


The tyre was changed and we were off again.

 






Before stopping antWarakurna we went into the Giles Weather Station. This is one of the few manned weather stations left. Most are now automated.

On a previous trip we had been given a tour and saw the weather balloon being launched in the morning.  There are no tours now but you can still watch the balloon if you want to be out there at 7.30am.

We were able to look around the site and see a small museum which has been set up for travellers.
















The old radar set up to monitor the weather for the Woomera Rocket Range.











One of the towers with the remains of a Blue Streak Rocket in front of it.
Len Beadell’s road grader. He was instrumental in opening up the area by building roads all around the NT and WA and SA outback.











This is his grader which is kept here to honour him for his great work.










Len Beadell’s information board in the museum.

One of his artworks.















We then drove to the roadhouse and ate lunch. We went into the art gallery to view the local indigenous art and whilst we were not allowed to take photos of the works we did take a photo of a sign.


A good message.















We then drove on towards the Docker River campground.
We called in to see one of Len Beadell’s plaques and then a tree he had blazed when building the road.


It is very hard to read the plaque .

The blaze on the tree.











We then crossed the border into the NT.

NB a bitumen road but unfortunately not for long.











We arrived at the Docker River Campground which has been set up by the local Docker River Community. Unfortunately the bore supplying the water for the toilets had dried up and some vandalism has taken place in toilet blocks.
However we found a nice camp with a fire pit.
Late in the afternoon we climbed a lookout tower and saw lovely views. A young medical student doing his placement in the Docker River Community joined us. He was from ANU and was really enjoying his time there. He said the Community was now a dry community so it was pretty peaceful most of the time.

Our camp below.

Sunset on the hills.











We had another lovely evening in front of the fire.

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