It was lovely waking up with
a bit of sunshine and the neighbouring kangaroos nibbling outside our window. It
was very peaceful being the only humans staying amongst the chalets at the top
of a hill in Jindabyne. And then the rain came!
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| Good day! |
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| Our Jindabyne home for 2 nights |
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| Lake Jindabyne in sunshine |
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| Lake Jindabyne pre-storm |
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| Jindabyne bush |
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| Cloud collection |
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| Lake Jindabyne from the top of our hill |
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| Neighbours |
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| Stormy backyard |
The reason they built a
series of giant hydro-electric power stations through the Snowy Mountain region
is because there is a lot of water.
There’s a lot of water because, well there’s a lot of rain (snow too, I
imagine). Unfortunately, we had to make
an on-the-morning decision to scrap our plan to climb to the summit of Mt
Kosciusko (which is apparently quite simple!).
Instead, we went the other
way, along the road to Cooma, the home of the Snowy Hydro Scheme Discovery
Centre. It was a great way to learn more
about what many describe as the greatest public infrastructure project
undertaken in Australia. We quite
enjoyed it, although parts of it could be updated and/or fixed. It was great to learn about not only how
electricity is bought and sold throughout the east coast, but more about the
scheme and the people who came to the region to help bring it to life. I thought it kind of comical that they
started the process with picks and shovels, but if that’s what you’ve got, then
that’s what you’ve got! Tens of
thousands of people worked in this region to make these dams, it’s really
pretty amazing. Many of the engineers, electricians, surveyors and other
workers came from Germany, Italy, Spain, Croatia, Norway, Greece and other
parts of the world.
What I would still like to
know more about is why hydro power is still more expensive than coal, because
as a result, hydro isn’t used to generate the bulk of electricity. Still, visiting has meant that I have more
questions to find the answers to, and I suppose that must be a good thing.
Our planned visit to the
well reviewed NSW Correctional Services Museum was interrupted by a hiccup with
the car, that fixed itself with no intervention from us but a lazy wait and try
it again in 2 hours approach. With the
right mindset, you can fix anything!
Today Kat woke up and watched some boxing, kangaroo style- the only kind she enjoys! After some yoga and breakfast we got back on the road to head to the capital.
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| It went on for quite awhile |
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| Look at the far kanga propped up on his tail |
