Hi all,
Well, we are back
home after out too brief, but spectacular trip though
the Painted Desert and along the
Oodnadatta and Borefield Tracks and I’m going to
bore ya all with our experience.
Murphy came along for the ride, but wasn’t too much of a mongrel.
I had the intention of recording an alternative treknote route through
the Breakaways “detour” which adds about 50 kms to the trek through
the Painted Desert, but the Laptop refused to accept communications from the GPS via the Targus USB/Serial adapter cable.
Tested this at
home and all worked
well, but at the start of the trek, as soon as I turned it on, applications were opening and closing “at will” and after a short time decided to enjoy the trip and not get uptight with the electronic gadgets. So although the Track was recovered from the GPS when I got
home, I was unable to record specific co-ordinates of each waypoint feature and only have odometer recordings, which is not good enough for a treknote submission.
The Breakaway detour is
well worth while, although like
the Painted Desert, is best viewed at sunset when the unique colors are at their best. The drive from the Breakaway
Lookout, down on to the “Moon Plain” is just fantastic and it was in this area, (marked by signposts) where a good portion of the Mad Max series of movies were filmed.
After reaching The Kempe Road intersection, we followed the original Treknote through to the
Arckaringa Homestead where we planned to
camp for two nights. On arrival, nobody was at
home except for “Charlie” the female Labrador/Kelpie dog who welcomed us anyway. We set up
our camp adjacent to the Cabins/
Toilet buildings and made ourselves at
home with a campfire in the large fire pit and wood from the large pile nearby. Sometime after dark we saw headlights approaching and soon after met the
young couple (Richard & Gemma) who have just taken over the care-taker role at
Arckaringa. We drove out to
the Painted Desert lookout areas (
lookout 1 and
lookout 2 & walk) and experienced the unique display of nature as the sun set.
The following morning we took a walk down to the Station
water hole were we saw some rather large “reptilian” foot prints in the dirt. Now they weren’t necessarily those of the Perentie, but were certainly from a member of the Monitor Lizard family, spanning about 5 to 6 inches from toe to heel. We said our goodbye to Richard, Gemma and Charlie and resumed our journey through to
Oodnadatta where we had a brief stopover before continuing on to Algebuckina (pronounced Alge-bu-keena)
Waterhole for our
overnight camp. The next day we travelled a short 143km along the
Oodnadatta Track to the “Little Oasis” of
William Creek on Anna Creek Station.
William Creek turned out to be a great base for this leg of our trip. We had planned to stay for two nights but ended up staying for three. The Owner/Manager of the Caravan Park was most surprised and said, “why?”.
Well, after setting up
camp and relaxing in the “feel good” and historic
William Creek Pub, we set off in the morning on the 142 km return drive out to Halligan and Belt Bay in the Lake Eyre National Park and is the lowest (surface) point in Australia at 15 meters below sea level. The track was in surprisingly good nick and provided a pleasant drive out to the Lake.
On our return to
William Creek, we dropped into Wrightsair, “The Spirit of the Outback” local Scenic Flight specialist to see what was on offer and this is where our whole trip took on a new perspective. Trevor Wright, the owner and chief pilot of this flight business offered us a great deal we just couldn’t refuse.
First of all we returned to
the Painted Desert, this time by air, for a sunset flight and view of the area few people get to see.
The Painted desert covers an area somewhat larger than that accessible by road and we saw and photographed scenery that can only be taken from a plane, or helicopter.
!MPG:11!
The following morning we returned to the
William Creek International Airport and our Cessna 210 transport for a flight out along the edge of the
Simpson Desert to
Dalhousie Springs. Now this just happened to co-inside with Channel 7’s Sunrise telecast from
Dalhousie Springs, of Grant Denyer’s “balloon expedition” across the Simpson as a fundraiser for Lung Cancer Research. We didn’t get to meet Grant, who had left just before we landed, but conversed with some of the support crew. After a dip in
the Springs, we flew back across the landscape to
Oodnadatta for lunch. This time in downtown Oodna, we picked up from the landing strip in the
Pink Roadhouse Limosine and got to meet and talk to Adam, the long time owner.
!MPG:12!
Adam turned out to be a real character and regardless of other forumites
views and experience with him, he is no doubt a knowledgeable bloke with a dry sense of humor, who has “seen it all”. Adam is also the town Mayor and we were given the key to the local Railway Museum, which has some fantastic history and photographs of times gone by, of the railway, life around
Oodnadatta and the vast area of the Anna Creek cattle Station. As we flew back to
William Creek we observed the absolute vastness of the country landscape and the size of some of the floodplains was absolutely mind blowing.
The last night at
William Creek was spent around the campfire quaffing a good red or three with our good friends who were traveling with us. Captured a rather good “Desert Sunset” photo and went to bed listening to the morose howl of the
dingo.
S!MPG:15!
The next morning we departed
William Creek and continued south east along the
Oodnadatta Track detouring briefly along the way to the historic site of Strangways
Ruins and the “Bubbler” in
Wabma Kadarbu Conservation Park. This section of side track was absolute “crap”, being severely corrugated most of the way. I tried 40 km/h and 60 km/h to little avail, although the 41mm diameter shockies took it in their stride. We turned off the
Oodnadatta Track at Bopeechee and headed south along the Borefield Track for our last taste of dirt tracking, before hitting the bitumen at
Roxby Downs. The Bopeechee Borefields area is the source of the
water supply to the Olympic
Dam mine and obviously how the “Borefield Track” got its name.
The Borefield Track was also in surprisingly good condition, but it was here that Murphy made his presence felt. Before our trip I had made a comment on this
forum whether I would put a couple of new tires on the rear of the Jack as the existing 694 Dueler’s were due for replacement after 65,000 kms.
Well I decided against the pre-trip investment, but 10 kilometers short of the bitumen, the right hand rear let go with an audible pop. I pulled over immediately, but probably because a stone had entered via the sidewall, the tire had self destructed.
!MPG:16!
I wasn’t really concerned though. This little incident was soon corrected and just added to the experience of outback travel. In fact, it could have been much worse. Just imagine, if I had a new tire on and the same thing happened. Interestingly though, my mate has the same model Jackaroo also running Bridgestone 694 Duelers. Try as I might, I couldn’t convince him to “air down” and he ran 34 psi the whole trip. I dropped to 28 psi as soon as I hit the dirt, but guess who got the
puncture? Mind you, he was traveling light, with a roof rack containing his tent, etc. I was towing the trusty Spirit Camper, which added another 1800 KG or so.
Overall, this trek through
the painted desert and along the
Oodnadatta track was a truly enjoyable trip, all too briefly completed, but never to be forgotten. The plane flights over the desert region of Anna Creek,
Macumba and Allandale Stations proved to be a worthwhile highlight. I will return.
Some points of interest.
Fuel at
Oodnadatta (as at 16th May) was $1.71 for unleaded and $1.78 for diesel.
Fuel at
William Creek (same date) was $1.66 for unleaded and $1.74.5 for diesel.
!MPG:13!
The funniest sight on the trip.
Heading back to
Adelaide, we were just outside of
Crystal Brook when my mate traveling behind, called on the UHF saying:- “
Check out the bloke approaching you”
As he passed us, I could see that he had a considerable hole through the front windscreen of his Falcon. Now that wasn’t funny of course, but it didn’t impede his speed either. What did bring a chuckle to our day was the site of the full face helmet he was wearing.
Hmm, maybe he found a place where crash helmets were more readily available than a front windscreen.
All dirt roads/tracks at present (except the track out to
the Bubbler) are in surprisingly good condition and a real pleasure to travel on.
An ExplorOz card is now in residence at the
William Creek Hotel. It is at the left end of the bar, just below eye level when seated and adjacent to the display of souvenir paraphernalia. It wears the Sand Man (SA) brand.