We planned to stay at Longreach for at least 2 nights but I think it will be 3.  We wanted to have a leisurely look around The Australian Stockman’s Hall of Fame and any other interest in town.  Early morning rise (beat the rush to the toilets) leisurely breakfast – everything starts after 9 am.  By 8 am everyone at the camp is awake (generators started up for cooking and hot water) we thought that we will start ours up too because we were unusually low on batteries and we needed to charge up the computer etc. That’s when my leisurely day started and Ron’s headache just began, he can tell you all about that.

Well, a little battery charging problem.  The batteries were unusually low after being on power for 3 full days at Carnarvon Gorge & I put it down to the fridge door that had swung open on our trip to Barcaldine.  Wrong.  The generator was fired up & the 240v battery charger was not doing anything.  The solar panels on the roof were working and the additional solar panels on the ground were working & charging at 14 Amps, but no 240v additional power.  So, I spent all morning poring over the manuals & wiring diagram, tracing the wiring & checking all of the electronics.  I traced through all of the additional wiring & electronics installed with the solar panels & finally discovered a switch that was not in the manual.  It needed to be turned on to connect the 240V battery charger output to the batteries.  After that the batteries were charging at 24 Amps with both solar & the generator & I kept the generator running all afternoon to boost the battery condition up.

We have so far told you all the wonderful times we are having.  I avoided the little mishaps, like we left Ron’s ‘phone charger at home (not too bad the car charges it) my camera’s charger and a cable to down load the photos (not too bad Ron’s camera is working). After Carnarvon Gorge’s well graded road the brake for the caravan stopped working, Ron had to fix it up, the nob from our brand new second gas bottle shook off (we are hoping to unscrew it from the other one when that’s empty as in Longreach you cannot buy one of those).  We wanted to bring some of our favourite CDs  (no worries we found Elvis Presley’s 72 greatest hits and a Latin American dance music in the glove box – they will be worn out or thrown out before the end of our trip).   Ron fixed the problem after lunch.   I am so glad that Ron is so handy because if it would have been up to my skills we would have been walking or on the next bus home.

We celebrated Ron’s victory by a glass of red and cheese and later on a romantic sun set walk – this place has fantastic sun sets.