On Christmas Eve we took a boat trip up the estuary from Port Augusta. The boat weaves through the mangroves until it reaches nearly the very end of the sea inlet - only accessible at high tide. You begin to get a feel of just how tough it was in the early settler and explorer days. The country is wild, beautiful and dangerous. Early explorers believed there was an inland sea in the central part of Australia and set off to make their fortunes. One cannot imagine how they managed to get so far relying on finding water sources on the way. Later on camels were the only way to send supplies into the bush to cattle ranchers and farmers. Every few years a savage drought would destroy years of effort as homestaeds and communities had to be abandoned. The camels arrived  by boat to Port Augusta with their Afghan handlers and it seems this is where the name “GHAN” comes from for the trainline. The first trans- Australian railway was constructed in the late 19th century with wooden sleepers. The line was eventually closed around 1960 because termites had destroyed many of the sleepers and the lines would buckle under the intense heat. The new railway has concrete sleepers and carries freight across Australia north to Darwin and West to Perth. Port Augusta is the terminus point for both lines. Similarly huge “road trains” leave via truck terminals heding north to Alice Springs.

In the afternoon we visited a private refuge for Yellow Tail rock wallabies. They live in a gorge near the Flinders Range a drive of about 1 hour from Port Augusta near Quorn. The countryside is beautiful and empty. Rugged red rocks dominate an arid plain. The wallabies live in the rocks surrounding a natural water hole. We were very lucky that the weather had stabilised and they were down near the path. This was the first time we had seen wallabies and kangaroos in the wild. The yellow tails have an amazingly smooth hopping movement which enables them to climb sheer rock faces seemingly effortlessly.

Christmas Day lunch  of turkey and all the traditional trimmings outside in Naomi’s garden. It felt very strange to be outside in the hot sunshine.