Expedition into Yandagooge Gap - Rudall River NP Day 2 (Photos & Video)

Friday the 18th July, 2008
Small unnamed gorge on the eastern side of Yandagooge Gap
(22 22 40.70”S 121 54 18.80” E)

It was a cool morning. After breakfast we surveyed the surrounding countryside from the nearby hill. There then followed a lot of pfaffing about this morning as we prepared the quads. I’m loaded to the hilt with 2 cans of diesel and one of water (a total of about 60 kgs) as well as the compressor and computer on the front rack. On the rear I have all the camping gear plus food, dunny seat and billy. Scotties got the two tyres, one can of water, his wife and the chairs. We’re not making that mistake again. If you roughing it, you may as well be comfortable. That’s the chairs I’m talking about, not the missus.

We were away at 11:30 a.m. heading south. We followed what had once been a track but was now so overgrown with shrubbery that it was more often than not, easier to push along off track to either side. This particular area was a green carpet of knee high grevillea which gave way in spots to patches of spinifex and then thick stands of acacia scrub. It took time to find gaps and weave a path through the often impenetrable walls of scrub. Often I’d find a well worn camel trail and quickly plunge along it hoping that the large beasties had forced a wide enough gap for the ATV’s. Earlier in the piece we found an old bore casing which contained water but at a good depth (over a 4 second drop for a small stone).

Needless to say the first hours going was tough and exhausting and amounted to 5 km only, walking pace. We took a quick lunch in the meager shade of a mulga tree such sustenance consisting of a warm sandwich and few gulps of hot water, the drink bottles having been at the mercy of the noonday sun. Then it was off again, the track long since having disappeared. The maps I’d made using Google earth images were accurate as far as my intended route was concerned but in reality, the actual terrain in front of you is often very hard to reconcile with that on the computer image. Of most difficulty is judging the actual height of geographical features. What looked like an imposing set of hills, might only be 50 metres high! A deep rift gorge that appeared in the two dimensional photograph to extend up from the floor of the main valley, may in fact rise sharply from the main valley to actually commence many metres above you, therefore being shallow and of no benefit when it came to being a likely place to hold water.

The area we were crossing was a broad valley approximately 5 km wide. It was bordered on either side by low stony ranges. As we moved southwest, the valley opened out into a large basin to the east. We skirted across this to join another range and found ourselves in the narrower confines of another valley. This was about two kilometers in width but the bordering hills were more impressive. I took a tack that saw us progress south east down the middle of this valley, hopefully to keep an eye on either side for unusual features or gorges. Initially we were again forcing our way through



unrelenting mulga and acacia but then a burnt out tract of bush provided us with a respite from the thick bush and gnarly scrub that seemed eager to drag us and our equipment off the machines. This afforded us 15 minutes of good going (about three kilometers). At one point I found what would have to be the worlds toughest tree. It was an ancient eucalypt which had withstood just about every calamity that could have been thrown at it. The main trunk of the tree stood about 10 metres high and to all intents and purposes, appeared dry, sandblasted, burnt and dead. There was not a single limb anywhere up its length. Then at the very top, a single branch jutted upwards with a ball of leaves about 2 metres across. This unlikely growth was so round it looked as if it had been recently manicured by some crazed outback topiarist! Never say die!


The larger flora consisted of Mulga (acacia), Bloodwood, Kanji and the occasional stands of Teatree and Melaleuca. The eucalypts consisted primarily of a white trunked variety on the rocky hills and around water courses as well as a couple of varieties of Mallee out on the plains. Of course do I need to mention the ubiquitous spinifex?



As we plunged into the scrub once more, I spied a twin topped mesa in the distance which I made a bee line for. Scott and Gaby had found a mother camel and her newborn. I steered the ATV up the mesa and then along its top to the southern end to be rewarded with rich views of the surrounding range and in particular, our intended course south into the gap. It was also possible to discern the remains of the track that I’d charted on Google earth. I was at this point very impressed with the accuracy of the maps I’d made using the Trackranger program. These consisted primarily of Jpeg images of the area lifted from Google Earth and calibrated. The two and three kilometer images were particularly accurate but the larger files allowed for greater discrepancy when calibrating and therefore accuracy suffered. They remained a great visual aid though despite the difficulty in judging terrain height as I mentioned earlier. Once down, I fixed both front tyres which had been staked by pieces of thin timber that had been sharpened to needle points by fire. How you ask? Well, just light a match and hold it vertically for a few moments, letting the flame burn straight up. Then blow it out and remove the outer ash. Presto! The match has a sharp tapered point. Now multiply that by the number of branches there are in thick bush. Easy math really. Thankfully, quick and easy to fix with the plugs and back up to 7psi in no time. Plodding on we reached a low line of hills that cut across the valley in an almost east-west line. The southern side was sandy, the northern, a low line of red bluffs that had been blown into arroyos’, gullies, caverns and caves by relentless wind (22°22'27.13"S, 121°53'11.47"E). We opted to track east along these cliffs to bring us closer to the eastern wall. We surprised more than one roo on our path, the caves providing obvious shelter for the local wildlife. Amazingly, some of these wind formed caves resembled open mouthed skulls as a photo and video will attest. Quite eerie.




The wind had picked up significantly by this stage so I hoped we might find a sheltered camp site along our path. On reaching the end of the bluffs we were able to squeeze across the last of the low ridges and then track the main eastern wall of the valley. At about 3.30 p.m. Scott was attending to a belt problem on his ATV, I explored a small canyon system and found a lovely campsite under the northern wall of the rill. It provided reasonable shelter from the wind, a suitably clear site for the tents and an abundant supply of wood for the fire. All ticks in the box for a nights stay as far as we were concerned. It didn’t taketoo long to get the tents up, wood collected and some of the days dust removed with Tay’s towel tablets…a miracle of modern science. I’ve used the old damp towels as a wrap for the baileys bottle which has then been placed in the windiest spot I could find up on the gorge wall. Hopefully the evaporation principals will chill it down for tonight. The days riding, while only 30.6 kilometers in total, has left us stuffed and an early night is assured.

Go to day three of the expedition

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