Hi all - I've been back for 2 days now after almost 4 weeks in the bush. I had a great time and am happy the way things have gone.
I'll summarise the trip which includes reference to
Rudall River, Talawana Track,
Windy Corner, Patience
Well,
Nipper Pinnacle, Gary Highway,
Eagle Highway, Ngarinarri Claypan,
Wiluna, CSR,
Carnarvon Ranges,
McPhersons Pillar,
Lake Blair, A Significant Aboriginal site,
Alfred and Marie Range and
Warri Well.
Forgive me if this dribbles on a bit.
The first section I was by myself and left
Perth for
Newman on Saturday 9th June. Camped near
Paynes Find and got a donga at
Capricorn Roadhouse before arriving
Newman to do some last minute purchases on Monday morning. Then north east along
Marble Bar Road and east along Balfour Downs /
Jigalong Road which was in good condition. The track east was good with a few sandy patches until Talawana
Creek. From Len Beadells
plaque the road gets corrugated but nice
views of the sandridges. I took the 28km short cut road into
Rudall River National
Park and camped near
Tjingkulatjatjarra Pool.
I headed east on the track that runs parallel to the river. There is very good
views here of the surrounding detached hills and breakaways. After the track leaves the river is becomes a little used spinifex track and I followed it all the way into Cotton
Creek were I purchased some diesel for $2.65/l. As I was heading once again to the Talawana I noticed 3 or 4 Aboriginal Smokes in the distance. These were visible for some way to the east. The Talawana east of this area is very corrugated. Camped at
Well 24 on the CSR.
Headed east again. Where the track leaves the CSR is deteriorates and is overgrown in some sections. Went to the centre of the Connolly Basin Crater, and
Windy Corner on the Gary Highway. In this area I would keep an eye out for Carnegies "Stony Banks", his 5 September 1896
camp and pointer to Patience
Well which I hadn't found by the time I camped about 20kms north of the corner.
After looking at some breakaways a kilometer or two north of the Patience Oil
Well Track I visited the Oil
Well which was decomissioned. From here to the south now I would be travelling "Off Track". To the immediate south and beyond I performed several unsuccessful traverses, on the
lookout for any signs that would indicate the position of Patience
Well before
camping. I spent most of the next day looking as
well before giving up.
I then proceeded to head south east as I wanted to claim the Confluence of 24S 126E which I arrived at the next day. Then I visited and camped at
Nipper Pinnacle. This was a rather isolated feature that I had been eyeing off on the maps for some years now. There was no signs of anyone ever being there, though there was a grinding stone in the spinifex some hundereds of meters away which I only noticed by accident. I left a message with my details and reason for being there in a sealed plastic container and put it amongst a pile of rocks I had brought to
the summit for just that reason.
Nipper Pinnacle is a three tiered
granite outcrop which is at the southern end of an unnamed breakaway range of which I fully encircled. There were animal tracks around but I could find no
water.
I determined to make it back to the Gary before sunset. I would have made it had I not coathangered the ute on a small sandridge just west of some unnamed hills halfway to the highway. This was a time I wished I had diff locks but had the ute jacked up on two sides and free after about 45 minutes of swearing and cursing. I arrived at
McDougall Knoll 15 minutes after sunset. My rear number plate is still in this area somewhere.
In the morning I thought I would give it another shot at finding the Stoney Banks whilst I was on this side of the Patience search area. These I found and was very excited at the time too. Without going into detail this find significantly reduces the size of the Patience
Well search area. Another time though, as I headed south to cut the
Eagle Highway and camped at the
intersection.
The
Eagle Highway had no signs of recent tracks. Some sections were completely overgrown and it would be easier to drive adjacent to the track. I saw 5 bush turkeys in this 66km section. At the next
intersection I had to spend some time
clearing vegetation from around the ute. I headed south and visited Ngarinarri Claypan where I spoke to Willem on the phone after finding one of his cards there. South now, still down the Eagle, where there were camels, emus and cats seen along the way. Camped on the
Gunbarrel highway.
Now into
Wiluna where I stayed Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday nights. My brother Gary will fly in Monday morning to join me. I might add I stayed out of town at Gunbarrel Laager Travelers Rest as advertised here and I found Gill's and Mal's hospitality wonderful. Breakfast too!! Spent the spare time doing minor chores on the ute, restocking etc.
I wanted to visit the Cararvon Ranges to the north so Friday I started up the CSR and camped at
Well 4B. That night Donkeys Stampeded about 60 metres from
camp and the noise was louder than the
Melbourne Richmond Afl game on the radio. In the morning went as far as Pierre Spring (
Well 6) before heading west on the track to the Cararvons. The
Carnarvon Range is very beautiful and has been unspoilt. I went down every track leading in. Went to Goodcamp
Rockhole. There are two unnamed ranges north of the
Carnarvon Ranges and I headed towards them on a track. The first 500 metres is very rocky. I visited
Talbot Rockhole which he visited in 1908 and has the inscription on the
rock face to prove it. And Virgin Springs where spring
water leaks out of the mountain and runs down the smooth faces. I climbed this mountain and got good
views of
Mount Methwin and
Mount Salvado and
Lake Kerrylyn.
Next day along the Neds
Creek Station track to
Johnson Cairn then into
Wiluna.
Monday I picked up my brother at the Airport and headed east where we camped at
Carnegie Station. Next day we arrived at
Everard Junction and headed up the Gary Highway and camped about 15kms north of the
Young Range near a
big tree. Then onto
McPhersons Pillar. The goal from here would be to try and attempt to get to the
Alfred and Marie Range perhaps via
Lake Blair. The first two hours was thick bush but we made it to
Lake Blair to
camp. The lake had
water but was far from full.
From
Lake Blair we headed east to investigate some outcrops in the distance. Then an old track was crossed which I followed to a
rockhole. This
rockhole was a depression in the surrounding rock surface and had some
water in it. There were birds everywhere. In the distance I noticed what at first glance was a white anthill. Upon investigation a white rock, such as one from a river many kilomtres away was protruding upwards maybe one and a half feet high. At its base was Mulga branches within which there were 4 to 5 rain making boards surrounding the base of
the monolith. These looked antique and would have taken many hours to carve to such detail. I also found a small stick weapon and a ceromonial stick discarded nearby.
We approached the
Alfred and Marie Range from the north hoping to drive south parallel to the eastern side of the range. Once again the bush was very thick and it was slow going. We went a fair way out east of the range to avoid the thick scrub before coming in to
camp in a small almost textbook, valley on a
creek near the highest point of the range. I explored the area on foot but I could find no
water. I looked to the east to where Giles had first seen the range and the view was most desolate.
The next day our goal changed. We were heading towards
Mount Cox when we crossed a track heading north south that had been graded maybe 3 years ago. We thought we would see if it would keep going to the
Gunbarrel Highway and thus give us more time to look for
Warri Well north of the
Young Range. This track went as far as a lake east of
Lake Gruszka when it ended. There was a solar powered
water supply there which I think a mining company may have left. Now we looked for a track to the south but the tracks went from the lake east of
Lake Gruszka eastward which I thought may have been an extension of the
cleared line to the west on some maps. We camped on the
shotline on an easting which was further east than our
camp in the Valley last night.
Next day we eventually got out of our entanglement of old lines, bush etc and came out a few kilometers west of
Mount Beadell on the
Gunbarrel Highway. There was significant wildlife at the lake east of
Lake Gruszka. We camped on the Gary Highway that night at the
Young Range ready to try and find
Warri Well the next day.
We went in first to the
Warri Well on the map and found nothing. Then had a look at
Mount Colin and the other hills at the end of the range before going on a bearing of 318 (with 4 degree variance epoch 1896) for a few
miles to try and find the
well. We did not find it, and camped on the spinifex flat.
The next day, after one final pass of the search area we headed back to the Gary, Gunbarrel, and made our way to Windich
Rockhole, just off the
David Carnegie road. The
rockhole was maybe 60 percent full. We camped another 20km down the road. The next day we made it to
Empress Spring where we both went down to the third chamber to the
water. Its pretty cramped in there and I drew blood twice on my head from the sharp adjacent rocks. Then we went out to the
Great Central Road and stayed at the motel in
Laverton. The
Explorers Hall of Fame was a nice surprise.
The trip concluded by way of
Menzies, Pidgeon Rocks, Windarling
Mine and
Kellerberrin.
10 punctures were had all in the off track sections. 2 were borderline sidewall on the same tyre but this tyre is still servicable. All others were in the tread. I'm pretty happy with the Coopers.
Total kilometres was 6793 consisting of Off Track 483km, Station Track 215km, Good Dirt Track 1316km, Blacktop / Good Gravel Road 2593km, Poor Condition / Slow Track 2068km, Overgrown Track 118km. A total of 75956 track points were collected along the way.
Was a great trip and now back to work Monday to start the grindstone.
cheers
Alan