Our Latest Travels - Whyalla to Little Topar

The next day we were back on the road.

This was the sky we woke up to.  We were rather pleased that the weather had been much better for our days of playing the tourist.

Leaving Whyalla signalled  the end of our time on the Eyre Peninsula and the start of our trip home.  We just drove straight through Port Augusta.  However, we didn’t turn left through the wind farm towards Wilmington, rather continuing around the coast. There were lots of showers on the hills.

We drove past Port Germaine, which we had visited earlier on our trip and continued on to Port Pirie.

It is one of the oldest settlements in South Australia and the second largest port.  It is also home to one of the largest lead smelters in the world.

Given its history, there were lots of old buildings.

Sadly, their very attractive railway station museum was under wraps of scaffold.  It is obviously undergoing a facelift.  Hopefully, we can come and have a better look around at another time.

We found a nice coffee shop in a converted church to enjoy morning tea.

There were a couple of nice murals around the town.

The things you see on the side of the road.

The next town we came to was Crystal Brook, which is considered the gateway to the southern Flinders Ranges when travelling from Adelaide.  More attractive buildings and a large Lace Monitor sculpture.

Their bakery is famous for its pasties, so of course that was our destination for lunch.

As we continued on our way we were driving beside the pipeline that delivers water from Morgan, on the Murray River, to Whyalla.

Next, we travelled through the small town of Gladstone.  It had some grand buildings for a sleepy little town.  In the past it had been a railway town where the rail gauge changed.

The weather had been showery all day, making for some dramatic scenery.

Our destination for the day was Jamestown, the larger town in the area.

After a very wild and woolly night we woke up to a sunny, but very cold morning.  The day was only to reach 13 degrees C.

We rugged up and went for a walk around the pretty town.  Firstly, some wall art.  The marine art is at the swimming pool, which adjoins the caravan park.  Very convenient for travellers in the warmer months.

We had a bit of a wander around.  

Although Jamestown is the larger regional town in the area, it is still quite small.

This had once been a rather flash department store.  Now, it is a rather upmarket ladies’ clothing shop.

There were a couple of places we wished to visit while in Jamestown.  The first was Charlene’s, the local quilting store, as they apparently have a nice museum of old sewing machines.  Sadly, they were closed due to family illness.  Jamestown is actually on the way to another area of South Australia we wish to explore in the future, so we can hopefully see the museum on our return.

The other place that sounded interesting was the Penn Cottage Museum of Pressed Glass.  This was particularly interesting to me, as I have my collection of green depression glass.  The museum is housed in the home of Kevin and Margaret Conway and is reputed to be the largest collection of pressed glass in Australia, with an estimated 14,000 pieces.  Mick never needs to complain about the size of my collection again. (Not that he does.) The ad states that the entry fee includes either a light lunch or morning or afternoon tea.  How’s that for service.

We were greeted by Kevin, who first up asked whether we would prefer tea or coffee and then produced a nice little morning tea.

Whereas I only collect green, the Conways collect all colours.  Apparently, the collection started when they added a couple of brightly coloured pieces to their bathroom window sill and then got a little out of hand.

The bright colours do look nice in front of a window. 

It was interesting to see how the pieces are made.  Kevin has a mock up of a glass mould.  Normally they are metal, not timber.

Float bowls are always one of the more decorative pieces.  I have three.  Wow!  What a collection.  There was a room full of them.

Some of the more unusual pieces were salad servers and serviette rings.  I do have a couple of green serviette ring.  These were in frames on the wall.  A great way to display them.

Buttons and jewellery are also unusual and yes, I have a few pieces in green.

The most collectable pieces of green glass are the uranium glass items.  I have a few shelves lit up.  Once again, the Conways have a room full, as well as many other uranium glass pieces in other displays.

There was so much to see that you really didn’t know where to start.

I suppose this collection isn’t for everyone, but we loved it.  We are glad we visited when we did, as the Conways are both elderly and Margaret is in ill health.  We could not guarantee that they would still be opening their home to visitors by the time we return to the area.

We purchased a copy of the book that they wrote on the subject about 20 years ago.  I have never bothered with any of the technical stuff in relation to the glass, such as brands etc.  My collection is based solely on aesthetics.  It will be interesting to have a bit of a read up on it.

From Jamestown, it was a drive up the road to Peterborough, thus ending that loop of our trip.  

We were back in the arid and remote country.

From there we drove back across the border into New South Wales and through Broken Hill, only stopping for fuel.

We continued on to the roadhouse at Little Topar, about 80kms east of Broken Hill.

It has a nice large area for camping, and as you can see, the clouds had completely disappeared.

This is on the main road from east to west, so lots of large trucks.

A beautiful sunset.

We decided to have dinner over at the roadhouse.  They sure know how to put on a feed.  We had a very enjoyable evening, chatting with other travellers.