A good drive from Adelaide takes us to Renmark on the Murray River. The Murray is the largest river in Australia. North of Adelaide it has high cliffs which overlook its large valley. Our park on Monday night was right on the river. In fact they had canoes which we rented to do some paddling on the Murray. There are larger boats on the Murray, the river has many houseboats plying the waters. One passed while we were launching our canoe.

Meanwhile, in the campground, children were playing in one of the neatest waterparks I have ever seen. This park is small, operated by the park, but it really entertains the children. There are a number of small slides, maybe eight feet high. A series of cone shaped containers are constantly filled with water until they become so full that the level of water above the pivot point on which the containers turn makes the container unstable and it suddenly flips over dumping its contents on anyone below. This is all topped by a huge bucket which behaves much as the cones. There are two large flows of water filling the bucket. Just before it becomes unstable a drain hose starts turning a water wheel which sounds a bell. Then the bucket turns over dumping its entire contents onto a roof just below the bucket. From there the water splashes in all directions but mainly in the direction the bucket pours. The entire surface of the water park is splashed in that direction. Children line up in front of the bucket as the alarm begins to sound. All this is accompanied by many screams of excitement and joy. We’ve seen the same in another park here. It all looks like great fun but it may not pass the lawyer test in the US.

From Renmark we continued driving along the Murray River on the Sturt Highway. This highway is named for the first European to lead a party from Adelaide to the far side of the continent through the outback and return safely. The Sturt Highway took us from the state of South Australia through New South Wales back into Victoria. We spent the night at the Ibis Caravan Park in Kerang. Yes, there are Ibis roving the grounds of the Ibis Caravan Park.

In the morning we discovered that our refrigerator had gone on the fritz. We had thawing meat and warm contents. I picked up the phone to call road service only to find that the phone had no time left on the contract. We would have to drive to a dealer where we could purchase a voucher to reload the phone with time so we could report our problem. Sixty kilometers later we arrived in Echuca and found a Coles Grocery. The friendly staff there sold me the needed voucher and then showed me how to add this to the phone.

That done, I called the road service number. An hour later we were at a shop in Echuca getting an analysis of our problem. The conclusion, the compressor is not operating. The solution, we’re waiting to learn as I write this. The refrigerator has been in and out of the cabinet repeatedly so this isn’t its first failure. The technician that looked at it said replacing the compressor isn’t usually done due to the cost which is about $1400 for this small refrigerator.

We found a nice holiday park for the night but will have to move to another site if we decide to stay tomorrow night. We have depleted the free internet allowance for today, we get a renewal in the morning and then I think we’ll head for McDonalds for more internet time.