Our week in Roxby downs had been necessary, not only to fix our trailer and give Jamie a chance to do some work, but also to ride out the heat wave of above 37-degree days. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t glad when we were back on the road again, and feeling free as we set up camp, 10kms from Coober Pedy in a rocky area with some trees and not another soul around us.
Pumba was happy as well not being tied up anymore and as we set up camp, he began his usual exploring and sniffing of the area. It was only when we saw him standing very still and staring at the ground that we started calling him back to us. He proceeded to ignore us completely so we had to go over to see what held his attention so captivatingly. And that was when we discovered the cutest baby eagle sitting on the ground and staring at our giant dog with big wide eyes. We ushered Pumba away, even though he hadn’t touched the bird and started stressing about what to do. Had it blown out of it’s nest in the strong winds, or been abandoned by his mother? We weren’t sure but didn’t want to leave it on the ground especially if no parent had come for it by nightfall. We decided to get in touch with a local kangaroo rescue sanctuary who informed us the best thing would be to bring it in to them to look after. So we picked up the fuzzy little eagle as it made the tiniest squeak and drove him to the sanctuary. The lovely people there took in the little bird and promised it would get the care it needed and would be released into the wild if and when possible. They even showed us a baby wombat they had rescued which was so amazingly adorable that I was tempted to swap it for Pumba.
The next day we went out to explore Coober Pedy and of course noodle for more opals. We had both become slightly addicted to noodling, as I think it had the same effect as gambling. Everytime you found a little piece of opal, you just couldn’t help but keep scouring the ground hoping there was a big, sparkly vivid one in the next dirt pile. We had managed at least to collect a small bagful of tiny opals and had noticed the ones in Coober Pedy were more white and opaque and seemed less vivid than the ones we had found in Andamooka. We also toured a fascinating “dugout” home and old mine in the town of Coober Pedy. It made total sense that the people would live underground in such a hot and arid landscape.
With only one more night at a rest stop along the way we started to get excited that our next stop was Uluru, the Australian icon right in the centre of our country that we had heard such good things about.
