We were on the road and only travelling 350km or so today, heading from Broken Hill to camp on the side of the road at out of a little town in SA called Orroroo.

We headed off and said goodbye to our neighbours, a kiwi couple and their girl Bree, who are travelling about shearing sheep on outback stations. The girls have been having a ball with Bree the last few days, riding their bikes, coloring in and hanging our playing. Like the girls, Bree too has minimal contact with other kids so latches on to them as quick as our girls do. It was nice to see and also know that Bree has been doing school with school of the air since preps and is doing well. Makes me think that Boo wont miss out too much and is learning more on the road anyway. So back to the blog!!! We stopped off to get fuel and thats when l realised that l left all this cut up fruit in the caravan fridge. Usually this doesnt matter too much but we were heading through a quarentine area today when in South Australia. Marty wasnt too impressed but held his tongue and set part of the van up after filling up with fuel to get the fruit out. I was quite surprised that he didnt crack it having to go to all that effort. After a few minot hiccups we were on our way, heading out of Broken Hill and into the outback. It was beautiful. Plains of nothing but flat red dirt and dry scrub with hills on the horizon. Have waited so long to get out amongst the outback and am totally looking forward to this part of our trip.

Now like l said, we are forgoing doing the Stresleski and Birdsville Track due to some roads being closed from the rain and floods. Now we are heading to the Flinders Ranges in SA and getting on to the Oodnadatta Track, making our way up to Alice Springs. We're are hoping to arrive in Alice Springs at the end of March to start work in early April. Cash is getting low and we are hoping not to need to spend too much in the next month or so, free camps will be utilised and alot of tourist stuff is free with nature and historical sites.

We arrived at the South Australian border in good time and passed thru the quarentine border in Oodlawirra with no problems. The bloke checking things out was pretty cool and easy going, didnt want to look in the van thank god!! There was nothing in it but we couldnt be stuffed opening it up again today.... We pushed thru to Petersborough and stopped off at the local supermarket to stock up with fruit and vegies. I think this is the last biggish town we see until Alice Springs. We think we have enough supplies that we wont have to spend too much more in the next two weeks!!! Heres hoping anyway... We checked out the statue of 'Bob' the Dog which was a local, and some even say national, icon. This dog was adopted by this local man way back in the 1900's sometime and this man was a train driver. Anyway, long story short, this dog boarded many trains, and paddlesteamers too, with or without his owner and crossed so many states by himself. Was quite a fascinating story, great aussie story. Anyway, we headed off to find our camp spot at a little town out the road, about 50 kms away, Orroroo. We eventually found it, sometimes the free camp spots are hard to find we're finding, and set up. There was already a few that had pulled up stumps and set up, the site was a bit off the road so hopefully we wont have too much noise tonight with passing traffic. After setting up, we decided to go check out this local attraction, Magnetic Hill, which was just out the road. We thought it would only take us about an hour all up round trip, but as always, our mud map wasnt so accurate. Well it partly was, but about 15 mins after passing some signs we turned around to find that some b******s (probably locals) had turned the signs around facing the wrong way. So up we went, on the right dirt road, around some bends to eventually arrive at Magnetic Hill. Now the name says it all. Apparently this hill allows your car to roll up the hill backwards, with the car totally turned off. We were skeptical but excited. So we pulled up, followed the instructions, turned the car off, put it in neutral and took the foot off the brake. We then started moving backwards up this hill slowly but surely. The girls were so excited and fascinated!!! Totally cool and unbelievable. After taking some pics and filming our magical experience more than once, we took back off to our camp site to chill out for the night. Had been a long day, even though we hadnt travelled too much distance, we were in the car for most the day. Looking forward to tomorrow when we arrive at Flinders Ranges, will be totally spectacular!!!

Bell Xxx

P.S. Didnt have the heart to tell you during my story telling but Magnetic Hill is an optical illusion. You are actually rolling down the hill but it looks like you are rolling up. If we hadnt known about that when doing it we would have totally believed that we were rolling up the hill backwards, because it does look like you're going up, not down!!!! Didnt have the heart to tell the girls either, so as far as their concerned, there is this magic hill in SA!!! LOL....