A Bit of Bad Luck

The day we left Port Fairy we had to get a boost, the battery in the van died.  We drove to Portland which was about about an hour away.  We drove to the end of Main Street and decided to stop to look around.  We spent about an hour wandering, it's a small town, so that was all the time we needed.  When we got back in the van it wouldn't start, would not turn over.  Dalton gets on the phone to the AllSeason's people and they arranged for someone to give us a boost and get us to an electrical shop to check things out.  The people at the shop checked everything over, Dalton wanted them to check all the systems.  You should see the battery that runs the living quarters.  Dalton said he has never seen such a mickey mouse job as that, there are way too many wires for his liking.  Anyway, back to the Electrical Shop.  Everything was tested and nothing should have been putting any excess draw on the battery.  They didn't have one in stock so had to order one from Ballarat.  We found a tourist park and stayed the night.  We were to be back at the shop at 12:00 the next day.

We got to the shop, the battery hadn't arrived so they rigged up a battery they had in stock to get us through until the next day.  Our appointment was now at 10:00 the next morning.

In the meantime the campervan people had made an appointment to have the air conditioner fixed in Adelaide, we had to be there on Friday morning at 8:30.  This was now Tuesday afternoon.  We went out and played the Pokeys and I won $35.00, we stopped for Chinese food on the way home.  We walked from the Tourist Park.

We were up bright and early on Wednesday morning, I did all the laundry and we bailed into the Van, all excited because the new battery would be there and we would be on our way.  We left town about 11:30.   Things were looking up.

We stayed the night in a little town called Robe, it was recommended by a lady from one of our wine tours that we had done that day.  It turned out to be a cute little spot.  We left for Adelaide on Thursday morning, it was supposed to be a 4 hour drive, it was a little longer than that but the roads were good and we stopped along the way. 

We stopped in Murray River so Dalton could get his monthly shot in the ass and he also needed to have his Lipitor refilled.  He had a prescription, however, they wanted one from a South Australian Doctor in order to fill it.  We found a walk-in Clinic and everything was looked after.  On to Adelaide.

When we arrived in the city, we wanted to find the place we had to be the next day so we drove around until we finally had to stop to get a local map.  We located the place and were lucky enough to find a campground in the vicinity so we headed off, by now it is 8:00, you have to get off the roads because you don't want to be running over any animals, the road kill here is unbelievable.  The place we found left a bit to be desired but it was only for one night.  We went to bed, up at 5:00.  Dalton was afraid he wouldn't be able to cross the highway in rush hour traffic.  We were about 20 minutes away from the place we needed to be.  Anyway, we had a good long coffee and read the paper from cover to cover by 7:00.  We sat in front of the building until they opened at 8:30.  I laid down and slept but Dalton was too wired to do anything but worry.

At 8:30 Dalton went into the shop only to find that the paperwork that they needed to fix the air conditioner had not been sent.  Dalton had to contact the Allseasons people in Melbourne and get them going.  By the time they got everything ready it was now 11:00 and they finally took the van into their shop to do the work.  We walked down to the Mall which was about 10 blocks away but we needed something to do and someplace to go, we were in a totally industrial area, not even a coffee shop for a mile or 2.  We finally got everything fixed and the paperwork all signed.  By 4:00 we got out of the driveway and headed out of Adelaide.  We wanted to stay around the area because there is so much to see and so much going on.  No camping spaces left in the vicinity so we headed north and are now in the Barossa Wine Region, a town called Gawler.

We are a 5 minute walk from the train station so we are taking the train into Adelaide and spending the day looking around.  Not what we planned but thank goodness we are flexible.