Esperance

27th November - schoolwork, drive along the Esperance coast - spectacular granite domes bordering sandy beaches opening on to a vista of small islands.

A handful of pines show that this was truly part of Antarctica and had lush wet forests.

Every beach in town is spectacular.

There were some people who swam out to this rock with a cave on top. The cave would have been about two people heights.

Caught the one bookstore in town that opens 3.30pm sometimes. Saw Skylab, old telephones, trains etc at the museum.

Picture right: they did fine NASA for littering. A radio station in California raised the money for fun to pay the fine. The radio host came over to present the cheque.

Skylab was launched back in 73 when the space race was about space stations. As per always, the Americans did it for a bit, lost interest. Skylab could have been boosted back into stable orbit, but it lost funding, so this ultra expensive collection of high tech solar panels and titanium tanks etc was allowed to fall back to Earth. Parts landed across Esperance, Balladonia, and a bit beyond towards Alice Springs.

I seem to have misplaced the photos of the recovered parts, but just picture a half crushed water heater, some bits of wiring, a chunk of foam insulation. The kids seemed more excited by cream separators and old turn dial telephones to be honest.