We did a driving tour of Whyalla this morning before hitting the road. From the Lookout on Hummock Hill the scope of the various industrial areas was apparent. This must have been quite an operation in its day.

The drive from Whyalla to Port Augusta was of no great interest, low scrub, lots of straight road and a lot more traffic than we have had over the past few days. The traffic was not surprising, this section of highway is part of Australia's only transcontinental road link.

About 30 km out of Port Augusta I noticed a warning light on the instrument panel of our Toyota and guessed that it was a dirty fuel filter. Thus the first stop in Port Augusta was the Tourist Info Center where we got directions to the nearest and only Toyota dealer.

We arrived at the Toyota Service 5 minutes after their 11:30 am Saturday closing time, but even so the mechanic was prepared to stay after closing to change the filter in our vehicle. Thus I got a first hand lesson in "how to change a troopy fuel filter", and verified that the filter was indeed dirty.

It also turned out that the kinked fuel hose that caused our previous problem is still an issue; so somewhere next week we need to have another go at this item

After all this vehicle stuff we went back to the Tourist Info Center which also happed to be an attraction called Wadlata Outback Center. It is a series of multi-media and physical displays depicting the geological, Aboriginal and European history of the South Australian region.

We both enjoyed Wadlata and spent over two hours sitting through the videos and examining the exhibits. I was particularly taken by the film from the 1950's called Back of Beyond which features Esmond Gerald "Tom" Kruse and his mail and cargo delivery route along the Birdsville Track.

One of the Wadlata videos was a master piece of Australiana, opals, afgans, camels, a town (Andamooka) built in a river bed that needs two pubs because when it rains it is impossible to cross the main street. This was a short documentary by a women journalist who traveled outback South Australia meeting interesting characters and seeing interesting things. Her closing statement was classic Australian slang.

"we have made some good mates, seen some beaut places" ... (pause) .. "seeya"

Moving on from Port Augusta it started raining and we started looking for a campsite for the night. After finding one caravan park booked out at Port Germaine we eventually stopped at a place called Lawrie Park. A free overnight stop for Caravans and other campers. To our delight it had a large kitchen area were we could set up to cook dinner out of the rain. Nina pointed out after dinner that it also had running water, if one did not mind that the water was running off the roof of the kitchen.

By the time the sun had set there were quite a few other campers in the park including two French young women traveling separately in their own vehicles after having worked in Australia for a year.