Fussell Family Simpson Adventure - Birdsville to Big Red and on to QAA line

Today, we were told the road to big red may be opened at 10am, otherwise maybe tomorrow.

So a nice slow start, with jaffles for breakfast, then into town to check out the situation.

The road is open!

So now we rush to do the last shopping fuel etc, and back to the campsite to pack up.

By 11:30 we're on our way to the desert. Sand flag attached and bending back wildly on the fastish road to big red.

The Birdsville pub was a beautiful sandstone building with tables carved from slabs of tree.

The bakery was also impressive with a flowerbed out the front full of sunflowers and desert peas in the middle of know where, and a kitchen that was open to the public from the counter and looked like a commercial kitchen from Sydney. I loved the lamb shank pie, which I ate at the foot of little red.

Air down and then over little red, our first dune.

Then a bunch of very wet and muddy wheel ruts, one that nearly stalled us, and the counterintuitive turn back east toward big red.

There's so many tracks heading up its hard to choose, but we point ourselves towards the one that seems most obvious, and up we go in low range 3rd gear. The bend at the top saps the power but regardless we're up.

The kids play around running down the 45degree slope of the dune face and Tony tried some of the hero tracks. It certainly is a big and beautiful sand dune.

We start heading west along the QAA line calling out on the radio every 10 minutes or so. There's quite a bit of eastbound traffic but the radio's working well and we're talking to the inbound traffic.

We keep heading on and the traffic disappears. We hardly see a car for the next 2 hours, when we decide its time to camp.

We turn right at the dune and head away from the track till we find the perfect camp site near a pool of water.

The photos look awesome with the setting sun. We notice some dingo prints beside the waterhole, quite fresh. We have a fantastic fire and a good nights sleep in the Simpson Desert.

Tony & Jacqui Fussell