A really interesting day today. We turned in to go to the Eyre Bird Sanctuary and saw a sign saying no dogs so turned around. Just after turning around some lads came along in three utes and asked why we turned around and we explained about the dog. One of them said not to worry about it, he's on the local station and often takes his dog through to the beach, just leave her in the van at the Observatory, they were heading through to the beach to fish. So we turned around again and headed towards the coast.

It is about 30kms in, the first part a fairly ordinary road and really wet, they had just had almost 100mm of rain in the last couple of days, their annual rainfall is about 300mm, so we went through a real lot of water over the road. It wasn't a problem other than the van got really, really dirty. The last 12 kms is a narrow sand track, definitely 4wd only. It was an interesting drive, Rose really interested in the flora, the sand being wet made the drive easier than it would have been in the dry.

We drove through and onto the beach, a bit daunting but we made it and I knew these lads were about and would help if I needed it. Anyway we popped over the last bit and onto the beach and there sitting off this beach that went as far as you could see in either direction was a Cray boat moored, I later learnt it belonged to a Vince from South End in South Australia, quite amazing that he would travel so far. Along the beach were 3 holding cages that they hold them in the water then drag them up the sand and a ute comes every 10 days and loads up with 500kg of cray and takes through to Port Lincoln. We stayed on the beach and had lunch then went back a different way to the Observatory. Again getting off the beach was a bit daunting but the Trakka is performing really well. we got a bit lost amongst the tracks going in all directions through the bush, the tracking device on our GPS is very useful, it again got us back in the right direction.

The old Telegraph Station was really interesting, and the caretakers Nick and Rachel were very hospitable. It never ceases to amaze me how tough the pioneers were that manned these places in the early days. There is a story of how the Station Master's 7 year old daughter and 5yo son were sent miles into the bush to fetch something or other and walking through the night, they became scared of the dingoes and hid while the dingoes ate their saddle. As a consequence their father gave them a hiding when they got home for being so iresponsible as to let the dingoes eat the saddle. Hmm, we don't let our kids play in the street now let alone sending them off into the bush.

After Rachel had made us a very nice coffee we headed back, another interesting drive through the sand. We stopped for a shower at Cocklebiddy ($3 each), water is very scarce it is desalinated bore water, so we couldn't wash off the van.

We pulled up at a camp spot past Caiguna. Their caravan parks are very ordinary and offer no more than a toilet and shower so you are better off staying at a bush camp with a toilet. A couple of big busses and 3 or 4 caravans with us tonight.