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Day 15 - Occaboolina Outstation -> Somewhere on the Oodnadatta Track
We set off to intercept the bitumen at Copley, an old town on the original Ghan Railway line. Copley's place in the world has been overtaken by regrettably finding itself between the Leigh Creek coal mines and the much larger coal company township of Leigh Creek.
One thing it's still famous for is the bakery and their Quandong Pies! Just in time for morning tea.
The Quandong is a native Australian berry with a Vitamin C content higher than oranges. It's an important traditional food source for Aborigines.
We headed South initially, to stock up at Leigh Creek; the last supermarket for about 1750 kms.
We then headed back North through Lyndhurst and on passed Marree to find a delightful bush camp by the side of the old Ghan Railway line.
We were in a dry creek bed, but had an old iron bridge from the railway as a backdrop.
There's a lot of nothing out there!
A lovely site with the essential en-suite tent in place for the ladies.
Day 15 - Oodnadatta Track -> William Ck
On the road again.
Still a lot of empty landscape.
About 40kms beyond Marree, there is the Mutonia Sculpture Park. It has some really big sculptures!
There's 'Plane Henge' - 2 Beechcraft on their tails, ....
... a friendly mechanical man, and...
...a Scottie dog (?) made out of an old Ghan Railway water tank.
We turned off the track before William Creek to go down to the shores of Lake Eyre, the lowest point in Australia at about 50ft below sea level. On the rare occasions that it fills, it's the largest lake in Australia. One of the reasons we came here was because there was water flowing into the lake from rain that fell in Western Qld 4 months earlier. What we were seeing was a once-in-ten-years event. It only fills to capacity about 4 times per century.
Lake Eyre - tide half in.
We took the road to Halligan's Bay and had ideas about camping there, but the camping area was extremely small, fenced off with bollards and with 4 others already there, no way we could get our trailers in and then out again. The road in was 65kms of atrocious corrugations. We took in the scenery (it was a long way across salt and mud flats to the water) and then left for William Creek and another 65kms of very rough road back to the Oodnadatta Track and then on to William Ck.
This is most of William Creek (the pub, fuel stop and general store).
William Creek was a refreshment and re-coaling stage on the old Ghan Railway from 1889 to 1929. It is now a refuelling stop for people and vehicles on the Oodnadatta Track as well as a busy airport running scenic flights over Lake Eyre and surrounding areas.
The semi-permanent population actually swells to about 9 in the tourist season!
Outback sunsets at their spectacular best.
Day 16 - William Creek
One of the highlights of the trip was planned for today - a flight over the Painted Hills and Lake Eyre. We had booked this flight before we left Brisbane as the company who does the flights had been so overwhelmed with flight requests that they had brought in another 4 aircraft (making a total of 9) to reduce the waiting time.
William Creek International Airport. Note the pilot crossing the Oodnadatta Track to get from the 'terminal' to the apron. :-)
Not a great place to go without food and water. (En route from William Ck to Anna Creek Station)
The Painted Hills is an area of low hills that glow with reds and oranges in the soil. It is on Anna Creek Station and is not accessible by vehicle.
Anna Creek Station is the world's largest working cattle station and at about 24,000 sq kms is a bit bigger than Israel and a bit smaller than Belgium.
Climbing out from the Painted Hills en-route to Lake Eyre. Mmmm, Cessna 210, nice!!
Umm, who was that masked man? (Photo by JT)
Lake Eyre on the horizon.
This is the deepest part of the lake when we were there. It was about 12' deep in the centre of the picture.
One of the reasons we took the flight was to see the pelican hatcheries.
For reasons no one has been able to work out, the pelicans know when there is water in the middle of Australia and come across a barren landscape to lay eggs on islands in Lake Eyre.
A group of Happy Little Vegemites after their flight (especially the one 2nd from left!).
Day 17 - William Creek -> Farina ruins
William Creek was to be our most Westerly stop on the Oodnadatta Track, so now we headed back the way we had come. Before we got to the evening stop though, we called in to see some mound springs at the Wabma Kadarbu Mound Springs Conservation Park.
This one is The Bubbler...
... and this one is Blanche's Cup. There is a continuous flow of water from them both.
Mound springs are the result of water from natural artesian springs depositing minerals which, over time, build mounds above the level of the surrounding countryside.
The next stop was Curdimurka Siding, a stop on the Ghan Railway that has been partially restored.
When the Ghan was decommissioned, the rails were torn up, but the sleepers and spikes were left behind. These sleepers would be over 100 years old and are like pieces of iron!
In the middle of nowhere!
One of the reasons for the station was as a watering point for the steam engines. This structure is the remains of a desalination plant to purify the artesian water for use in the locomotives.
Curdimurka Siding, looking South, and...
... looking North. It must have been a very lonely posting for the staff.
Passing back through Marree we spotted this camel.
It's made out of sleepers from the Ghan. Not too much goes to waste out here.
The end of today's leg was Farina, a ghost town that is being restored by volunteers.
One of the buildings under restoration.
Farina was also a station on the Ghan and was developed as a prospective agricultural hub in the late 19th century, but the early settlers underestimated the amount of rain in the area and the project died along with most of their crops.
However there is a good camping area under the trees here and a HOT SHOWER!
In an area with not much shade, this is a regular oasis!
For a hot shower: Light fire in fireplace on left, wait for water to heat, have hot shower, BLISSSSS!
Note that this building is also built out of old Ghan sleepers.
There was a lot of bird life around Farina.
Here's a lone Galah trying to ignore all the noisy Corellas.
Day 18 - Farina -> Montecollina Bore
A bit further South from Farina is the village of Lyndhurst - petrol station cum general store, pub and a few houses are all that mark the beginning of the Strzelecki Track, our route North-East to Innamincka and Queensland.
Don't forget to refuel here - it's a long way to the next fuel stop.
Note the UFO that's landed at the back of the pub on the right.
Good thing the road's open all the way through. I'd hate to get stuck at any place called Mt Hopeless!
The Strzelecki Track was pioneered by Harry Redford, a cattle rustler and sometime bushranger (AKA Captain Starlight). In 1870 he stole and then drove 1000 head of cattle from Longreach in Qld through to Marree in South Australia, a distance of around 1500kms. This was only 10 years after the explorers Burke and Wills had died trying to cross much the same sort of country. He was caught and tried 2 years later, but released because his epic adventure impressed the jury!
The sort of country across which he drove the cattle. This is part of the Strzelecki Desert.
This was certainly not John & Sandy's day!
Despite stone guards on both our trailers to stop rocks being flung up and ricocheting into the back windows, one found its target.
Two rubber mats and a roll of 100-mph-tape later, they were good to go. This repair was good enough to keep most of the dust out of the car for the the next 2500kms until they got back home to Victoria. I hope he remembered to retrieve the Thermos.
On this track you tend to meet road trains with two or three trailers. This one is moving cattle a lot easier than Captain Starlight did. It pays to move over and stop as they kick up a lot of dust and stones at 80~100kph.
Tonight's stop was at Montecollina Bore, another natural spring from Australia's Great Artesian Basin.
Sue is trying to sneak up on one of the flocks of Corellas that come in to drink at the bore.
The water is OK to drink (ie: It won't kill you) but we tend to bring our own. The Corellas don't have the luxury of a trailer in which to store their water so they're stuck with bore water.
Everyone seems to be paired off here. Both Corellas and Galahs mate for life.
Continue to Week 4 -> SA - Week 4
(Yes, I know we've only had 5 days in this week, but the page is getting too long.)
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