Dinosaurs and other Saurs (4)

 Friday 23 August 2024

The water here is artesian water and smells strongly of hydrogen sulfide and more! We now have a system of boiling a kettle full at night and letting it cool over night for our water bottles. Hopefully that will work.

We spent the morning searching for opals in the many shops for Dianne. I ended up buying a boulder opal pendant for myself and some ammonite earings. Dianne bought the earings she wanted and a polished ammonite rock. Morning tea was at the bakery.

We ended our morning browsing the Waltzing Matilda Centre. It had been burned down in 2015 just before I was here last and is now beautifully rebuilt and restored. This set me to reminiscing about other times I've visited Winton:

1. Late 1980s or early 1990s with Surrey and the kids while visiting one of Surrey's colleagues (John Reynolds and wife Margaret) who lived in Longreach. We drove up to see the Lark Quarry dinosaur footprints and had terrible car trouble on the way back.

2. In about 2015 I came on my first dino dig and the temperatures were unseasonably hot to 36C.

3. In 2017 I came on a CFT Central Qld bus trip with Kerrie.

4. in 2024 this dino dig. It looks as thought the temperatures will again reach the high 30s for our dig week.

I decided I needed to take some ginger beer and chips with me as dehydration meds so we walked to the grocery shop (Spar) to stock up on supplies. Then a walk back via Arno's wall to show Dianne.

Then we escaped to the cool of our airconditioned room again.

At 4:30 Greg North did another presentation about what Winton was like in 1895 when Banjo Paterson would have been here.

After the presentation we walked across the road to the Australian Hotel for a pizza dinner, a change in the style of cooking and most welcome. Notice all the Citroen 2CVs in front. They are here in droves for their RAID.

A chance chat with a lady led us to a sheep dog presentation at the back of the hotel. We both really enjoyed this presentation and learned a lot about how working dogs are chosen and trained.

Back to our room for the evening ritual which of course includes cleaning our teeth! We've both gone off this job as it means rinsing in warm, smelly water - yuk!

Saturday 24 August 2024

After being dehydrated though the night I woke this morning wondering about how to keep cool next week. I then remembered I'd brought a small travel towel which will be just the thing for digging in the heat.

A quick call to Geoff for his birthday and it was good to have a catch up.

This morning we visited the Corfield and Fitzmaurice Museum and Craft Shop next door. It was a great browse.

Then on to morning tea at the Bakery and a browse past the street market tables. We bought some home made biscuits to take with us and Dianne bought fresh dates grown in Winton.

Back to the room but soon Dianne returned to the Waltzing Matilda Museum as she wanted to look more closely at some of the exhibits. I lazed in the room and read my book.

Dianne went on a sunset tour but I walked along the main street to watch the sunset after my lazy afternoon nursing a grumbly stomach.

Then I had dinner of bangers and mash, enjoying the mash and gravy on my stomach and leaving most of the sausages.

I then watched SBSFood until Dianne's return (no ABC here).