Day three................Saturday, November 11th

After our rest day, we were up early, had brekkie, packed up and were on the road by 8am!! The weather was much cooler, although still a bit windy. 

We looked at this sign, and laughingly wondered about Darwin, but stuck to our original plans to head West.

The landscape was changing to more arid, bushy vegetation after we left Pt Augusta. Headed towards Iron Knob which you can see in the distance of this photo. This mine had been closed for a few years, but is now a working mine again. We did not go into Iron Knob, as we had both been here years ago.

We soon came across farming land around Kimba, which is the halfway across Australia stopping point,.....

........and home too the big galah, which has recently had a paint job and now looks very much cared for.

We refueled at Kimba, before heading further with a stop at Wudinna.  There were many signs of harvest occurring with headers in the paddocks and semi trucks delivering grain to the silos. At Wudinna, there is this statue of a farmer and sheep. Apparently Wudinna is the agricultural town of the year.  A quick stop was made at the local Foodland store for a stockup of icecreams, and forgotten sox and jocks!!

Next stop was at Poochera, where the only roadhouse has now closed. We made lunch in the van and ate it there.

The next town was Ceduna, where we had thought to stay, but it was still only 2.30pm, so after a quick tour around the town, we decided to keep going. 

Next stop was at Penong, where there is a large collection of windmills......

...........and this is the largest windmill in Australia.

Not far from Penong, there was a campsite that Barry had visited a few years ago, so we decided to head for that. After following a very rough road for about 20km, we found out that there was no longer camping allowed at Cactus Beach!! 

So we turned around and drove back to Penong Caravan Park for the night.

Along the way to the beach we passed these huge sandhills...........

.....and also these mounds of white 'stuff' had us wondering what it was. There were a few signs saying keep out, and had GRA mining Operations listed. So after a bit of googling, we found out that this site was the largest Gypsum deposit in the southern hemisphere!! .....what did we do to find out this info before Mr Google??

At the end of 2 days travel we had covered 1,160km since home.

Blessings, From Jude

 

Day two................Friday Nov 10th

 The forecast for Day 2 at Port Augusta was for a temperature high of 43deg, with strong winds, so after some discussion, we decided to take a day to rest. The thought of a flat tyre or other dilemma on the side of the road in the heat did not sound appealing.  As the car had not been unhitched from the van, we stayed inside with the air con, which did a fantastic job of keeping us cool. We had no set schedule to be anywhere.

The park did have a swimming pool, but we did not use it. Tis many years since I have worn bathers and didn't think to pack any.

This park was immaculate, very reasonable cost, and we would recommend anyone to stay here. The van is set up well for off road camping without power, but it was great to have the power for the aircon.

Our day was spent relaxing and I did some work on the laptop downloading photos for blog posts, which had been put on the back burner recently. Barry installed a CelFi Go to help us connect to internet when we are in more remote spots. 

A cooler change came through in the early evening. It was a quiet, restful day which was good after the hectic time getting ready to leave.

Blessings, From Jude

Life changes.....

Before I post the next section of newsfromjude, and because this blog is also a record of my life happenings, I will tell of some recent changes in my life.

If you have been reading my blog for any length of time, you will know that I have been striving for a more balanced life for a few years now. A special friendship has unexpectedly developed with a long time friend. While I am intending to be machine quilting for customers for some time yet, I am heading into semi retirement and have the balance that I was seeking.

We have been travelling around our state a bit and I have blogged this recently.

Barry recently expressed a desire to travel to WA to visit family and asked me if I would like to go along with him. Of course I said yes and here we are, over the border into WA and expecting to be travelling for a few weeks.  While there won't be any quilting news in the coming weeks, there will be reports of our travels and would like to share these with you.

*************************************

DAY ONE..................

After packing the caravan, last Thursday we left Bordertown about 9am.

 We had no set schedule, except for heading west. Our first stop was at Tailem Bend for morning tea at the local bakery.

From there we headed through the city and then north. We stopped Port Wakefield for fuel, before continuing north. A quick detour into Snowtown and then back onto the highway. I saw the signs pointing to Brinkworth and Crystal Brook, which were 2 towns that I lived in during the early days of my married life. Unexpectedly this brought a few tears as memories came.

At the end of Day 1 we settled into the Pt Augusta caravan park and heated frozen meals to end our first day on the road.

Blessings, From Jude

 

Catching up again, recent happenings......

 ......this is a quick catchup post of newsfromjude happenings that I have not posted yet. They are in no particular order and I am not home to check my diary for dates.

There was a family reunion in Murray Bridge recently, but the date clashed with our quilt show, so I was unable to attend. There were 35 members of the Pope family present. It was convenient that I had a trip to the city the day after the exhibition and one of my cousins was staying with mum and still in MB, so we had a catchup. I had not seen my cousin and her husband, who live in Queensland since 2004, so it was special meet up again. Hopefully it won't be another 17 years before we meet up again.

DS and family called in to visit me on the way through town after a holiday at Hall's Gap...........

....where they met up with DD3 and family for a few days.

There was a last minute decision to take a few days break to the Riverland over the October long weekend. This was a early evening photo by the river, with the full moon reflection in the water......

A drive to Renmark and a climb to the lookout at Headings Cliff for a photo opportunity..........

.......and watching the houseboats cruising up the river...........

............all the houseboats on the river at Berri and the bridge to Loxton in the background.........

.............the next 2 pics were taken at Lock 4...............

....and this is the big Pelican at Loxton...........

............and the river...........

..the Tree of Knowledge showing the river levels at each flood over the years..........

There was another trip to the North of our city and a few nights at the Port Wakefield caravan park.............

...........and a drive around the town........this is the old courthouse............

..and another day we headed down the Yorke Peninsula as far as Ardrossan........

.and a quick trip in to Port Clinton on the way............where they had these paintings......

..at Ardrossan there was a car club display ..................

Ardrossan is a major grain growing area and has these massive silos .............and the grain is shipped out of here............

..the cliffs near the town jetty...........

There were also food vans and a kite display...........

..........and I did hear later that the town was celebrating their 150 years!!

We found a lookout just out of town, and took these pics of the amazing views.........

The lookout was at the site of a mine, and I discovered it was a dolomite mine. I admit to having to go to Mr Google to find out what dolomite was and it's use. Apparently this is the largest dolomite mining operation in Australia.

Another event was the celebration of Miss Olivia's first birthday........... and here are a few pics from our lunch at Tanunda..........

I think that's all the catchup news for now. I do have more travel news to post in the coming days.

Am currently away from home for a few weeks travelling around this big country of ours, so stay tuned for updates.

Blessings, From Jude

Customer quilts update.............

This is a quick update of customer quilting. There are a few more pics to post one day, as I have quilted about 7 just recently. But they are still on my camera and not downloaded to the laptop. Too tedious using the phone and I am not home with more details of the photos.

This was made by Sherrel, using a lot of scrap fabrics. She was pleased with using them up. It was quilted allover with a swirls pattern.

Mary made this quilt, using one of my Ready Set and Sew kits, and it is called Kaye's Roses. It was quilt allover with a pattern called Roseleaves.

This quilt was made by Prue and was custom quilted, as the following photos show.

Also made by Prue, using up her I Spy fabrics ready for future great grandchildren.

This quilt was made by Sue, using a Rachelle Denneny pattern and quilted allover with a floral pattern.

Another quilt made by Prue, and using up lots of pink and green fabrics. Apparently a couple of grand children love this and have requested the quilt. Quilted allover with dragonflies.

This quilt was made by Sue, featuring a tiger panel in the centre. This was quilted with a jungle leaves pattern.

Another quilt made by Sherrel and using a lots of scraps.

That's all for now. Time to head to a cooler spot. The temperature has almost reached 43 deg F today, so not a lot is happening. Tomorrow will be a cool change. Am on another trip which I will post about soon.

Blessings, From Jude

Happy birthdays

 Sorry for late post, yesterday there were 2 birthdays in our family, and life got in the way. Better late than never.

My oldest daughter turned 49, and my youngest grandie turned 1 year old.

As I am in the car and doing this post on my phone, I will post just one photo. This was taken on Saturday at a family celebration and is of GD1 and GD11.

Miss Olivia was a bit overwhelmed with all the people. I do have other pics sent yesterday from her actual birthday but they will wait for me to be on my laptop.

Will be back periodically with updates of the latest newsfromjude. 

Blessings, From Jude