Friday 8, Mar 2024
That afternoon we Continued north towards the beginning of the Oodnadata track. A road which leads to the small town of Oodnadatta. This town began as a railway town in the early days of Australian Outback settlement. While the railway was being build, supplies were brought in by camel, along the Oodnadatta track. It is a famous route that is interesting for its historical significance and also because of the landscape and plant and animal life.
We decided to stop for the night just after beginning track. Before sundown, we took a walk along where the first railway was built to look at one of the old siding buildings that helped support the steam trains when they came through. This place was really very neat. It was in the absolute middle of nowhere… And it was very hot, dry and desolate. We didn’t see any animal life except flies, which were exceptionally bad. A local further along the track told us, that the flies are not usually anywhere near as bad. I am glad to hear that, because I was wondering how anyone could handle flies like that on a permanant basis. The plant life was very determined. It seemed like nothing could live in such a place, but I found succulants and flowers, and there were small shrub like trees as well. The colours of the sunset on the desert landscape were quite beautiful.
Saturday 9, Mar 2024
The flies and heat were so bad, that we decided to just drive all day long, so we could be in the air conditioned, fly free car. We drove past, Lake Eyre, which we were hoping might have water in it, but it didnt. Lake Eyre is the lowest point in Australia at 15m below sea level. It is usually just a salt flat, but when enough rain falls in Queensland and North Australia, it moves across the country and fills up this basin. Bird, plant and fish life abound when this happens every so many years. The desert comes alive.
Since there wasn’t much to see here, we continued to Coward Springs. This was a place where travelers used to come for water and a resting place along their journey. The original bore is still in place. We got to bathe in the same place as the original people from back in the day. It was a very refreshing stop despite the flies. The man who runs the place also has a small stand of date palms that he harvests each year. We were able to taste the fresh dates… they were different than any date I’ve tried. They were warm, gooey and buttery. Besides travelers, and dates, this man also ran cows on this land. It is unbelievable to think that people farm this land. We kept asking ourselves, what do the cows eat out here? But, they must be adapted to eating acacia and other desert shrubs.
After Coward Springs, we kept going until we reached the town Oodnadatta. We stopped for dinner and the kids played at a park for a little while. Then, since we still didn’t want to be outside in the heat or deal with flies, we decided to drive 3 more hours to Coober Pedy. We were also very tired of the dust. The track was not sealed, and the type of dust out here just worked its way into every crevasse of the caravan. We even found it inside the fridge. We wanted to be able to clean it up only once. The max outside temperature reading from our car for the day was 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit). The total distance we travelled in this day was just under 600 km. After arriving in Coober Pedy, we spent an hour cleaning up the dust and then went to bed.
Sunday 10, Mar 2024
We spent quite a good portion of the day in Coober Pedy. This town is known for being a place where people live underground. They build their houses and shops into the sides of hills. They are also known for mining opals. So, we had a look around at the streets and what this looked like, before having a go at ‘noodling’ as they called it, for opals in the leftover piles of dirt that had already been mined. We didn’t find a lot, but it was fun anyway. We did find quite a bit of gypsum, which is interesting, but not valuable.
The flies and heat were still pretty bad, so we went as far as we could in the last part of the day. All the driving on this day was literally like driving on mars. There were no trees, and it was just flat as the eye could see. It was incredible, to drive across this landscape for hours on end! I didn’t get any photos of this because it just doesn’t look like anything on the screen. It’s very hard to take photos of a landscape where there isn’t anything in the distance. We stopped for dinner at Lake Hart and then kept going until we were just north of Port Augusta and called it a day. Total kms covered this day was 500. The last 2 days have been our longest on the road so far.
Inquisitive Bird 