Roamin' in Roma

It's been a lovely day in Roma after the chilly start.  It warmed up quite quickly and most of the day was about 26 degrees, quite pleasant.

We returned to the Visitors' Centre for more information.  Instead of looking for auto electricians and Toyota dealers, we were after sights to see in Roma.  We visited the Oil Patch exhibition inside the tourist centre, buying combined tickets for the day and night events.  Daytime is not really an event, it's a self-guided tour about the history of oil and gas exploration in the area, which has been going on for over a century.

          Big Rig at Roma. This was used for oil/gas exploration before they came up with mobile rigs. The truck is an old International known as JP's truck, JP being an old identity in the area.

Then we headed for the biggest bottle tree, not far away.  It's big, alright!

It being my birthday, we decided to have a pub lunch instead of the usual home made sangers. We'd noticed the Club Pub advertising meals for $12.90, and it turned out to be a really good deal, a huge countryman's lunch on a big plate.  I'd ordered steak with vegetables; the steak was delicious and quite large, and was accompanied by carrot, pumpkin, peas, mashed potato AND chips, and just to fill in the gaps, pasta.  Needless to say, some remained on the plate.

We walked off the lunch in the advertised "Bush Garden", which was disappointing.  A small lake with a few ducks, surrounded by a couple of copses with some of the trees named.  I suppose in an area so starved for water, no decent river here and an annual average rainfall of less than 600mm, a little lake is easy on the eye. Anyway, we had our walk.

So it was time to tackle the groceries.  Woolworths and IGA are both here, but we haven't noticed Coles.  We chose Woollies, as did hundreds of other people, and it's school hols so the kids were along too, most of them pushing their own empty trollies, and not looking where they were going- the parents, that is.  We've never come across so many people blocking the aisles, oblivious to everyone else.  Oh dear, we're still city slickers and haven't settled to the slow pace of life in the country.

Back on the farm, some people have left, others have arrived, so at $20 per couple, Pat's doing OK.  We haven't seen any animals on the farm so we take it to mean her conversation last night meant she has not yet bought any beasts, so at least this is providing her with some income.

 We think these are dusky woodswallows- we've seen them all over these Western areas, always in a bunch, always on the ground, though they fly away if you approach.

 Some of the retired farm machinery.  There are also 3 caravans of different vintages, and two old cars, one shown below. The other is a slightly less vintage Ford kept in a shed.

Name that car!  We have no idea except that it's American.  A gangster wagon if ever I saw one.

Soon we'll be setting off for the Evening Show at the Big Rig. Tomorrow we'll visit Injune, north of here, on the way to Rolleston, where we'll stay several nights while doing day trips to Carnarvon Gorge, which looks gorgeous in  the postcards I've seen, can't wait.  There's no TV reception at Rolleston, don't know about mobile reception so it might be a while before we're online again as after Rolleston we'll be going to Sapphire, and I don't hold a lot of hope for internet reception there either.  We plan on staying there for a few days, maybe a week, because we'll meet up with Kim and Debbie.  Chris spoke to Kim yesterday and they're leaving Bowen tomorrow in their van.