Wirraminna Station – 30 July 2009

    

From Roxby Dam we drove to Wirraminna Station where we camped near the shearer’s quarters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the road to Wirraminna we passed Island Lagoon a salt lake where the Americans built their tracking facility.

Shortly after this we stopped at Lake Hart.

 

 

 

 

 

The line for the modern Ghan passes next to Lake Hart and it was interesting to see the modern concrete sleepers with sprung steel attaching plates, in place of the old Jarrah sleepers and steel ties.

Tricia enjoyed one of her favorite pastimes, salt lake walking.

 

Quite often we pass Wedge Tailed Eagles feeding off road kill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sections of the Stuart Highway have been developed as airstrips to allow the Royal Flying Doctor Service to use them in event of emergencies. They come about every 80 kms.

Roxby Downs, Andamooka, Woomera - 28 to 30 July 2009

We left Marree in the afternoon for the mining town of Roxby Downs, following the Oodnadata Track.

By chance we met Paul Clancy, who had left Beltana Station the day we arrived, and was trekking with his four camels from Port Augusta to Alice Springs. He stopped for lunch and a chat and we passed on Graham and Laura's best wishes and replenished his supply of dark chocolate.

 

 

 

 

Along the track a local homestead has commissioned an artist to do an annual art work. Some of the results are below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The recent rains have brought out many of the desert wildflowers - beautiful and delicate in the harsh landscape.

Having visited most of the abandoned copper mines in South Australia, Roxby Downs with the nearby Olympic Dam Mine the world's sixth largest copper and largest uranium deposits, is still in its growth phase. 

In addition to being a good pit stop as the water [bore water put through reverse osmosis] is perfectly pure and being a mining town the shopping is good, it is also a most interesting area.

The first day we toured the Arid Recovery Reserve. This 86 sq km fenced area of Arid lands excludes feral animals especially cats and foxes allowing the reestablishment of populations of Greater Bilbies, Burrowing Bettongs, Western Barred Bandicoots and Sticknest rats which had survived on off-shore islands.

They have designed a special fence dug in with a floppy over hang which prevents cats from climbing over. They hope by eradicating foxes and cats they will be able to use these ark populations to repopulate mainland Australia.

Both the Bilbies and Bettongs dig small holes when they forage which leaves behind a perfect little seed bed for indigenous plants.

The highlight of the tour was seeing the Bettong's after sunset, although they did not perform perfectly for the camera. As the guide said the Bettong "is not the sharpest knife in the drawer" when it comes to species, but it is extremely cute, looking like a miniature kangaroo.

The next day we drove to Woomera 80 km. south of Roxby Downs. It still is a prohibited area, although the village is now open to tourists. A woomera is an aboriginal word for a spear thrower which enables the spear to be thrown faster than by the arm alone. Woomera is the worlds largest defense systems test and evaluation range.

The UK Government, having suffered the German V2 Rocket attacks, put a high priority on developing their own capacity. As there were no suitable places for testing in England in 1947 Woomera was established as an Anglo Australian joint venture. The Woomera Prohibited Area now 127,000 sq kilometers, about the size of England or Florida, was established. It was initially twice that size.

In the 1960's the USA also built facilities there. The national Missile park has examples of missiles and Rockets tested over the last 60 years.
The Woomera Heritage Centre has an extremely good historical overview of Woomera. It must have been a great place to live, working with very smart people at the forefront of research. The town has very happy vibes.

Although Woomera is less relevant it is still used for testing.

The following day we toured the Olympic Dam Mine. which contains Copper, Silver, Gold and Uranium, and is owned by BHP Billiton.

This was a very good and instructive tour. We were not allowed to take photographs. Olympic Dam is named after a tiny water bore and tank established by the Roxby Downs sheep station the year Melbourne hosted the Olympics.

At present it is an underground mine but they want to move to open cut. Like all things Uranium this will be a controversial political decision.

Marree - Lake Eyre 26 - 27 July 2009

From Arkaroola we drove to Marree via Copley. This tested Trish's packing for dirt roads. We have been pleased that so far it has stood up successfully and we haven't found the biscuits reduced to crumbs or the oil all over the cupboard.

Marree was known as Hergotts Crossing until WW1 when anti-German sentiment saw the name changed. Marree means place of many possums. It is the intersection of the Birdsville Track and the Oodnadatta Track.

For a while it was the rail head for the Ghan Express train. Later when the line went to Alice Springs the track's gauge width changed here [don't ask - it is an Australian thing!!] it was where one was woken up in the middle of the night to get onto a narrower or broader gauge train.

 

People who endured that journey say it was a nightmare, but at least the hotel did a roaring trade as all the passengers had to leave the train. Marree declined when the train line relocated west.

The Oasis Caravan Park is basic but offers a $10 barbecue. For that you get a mixed grill and dessert of apple strudel and vanilla slice, cooking like Nonna used to make courtesy of two Italian backpacker girls who along with a visiting station owner who had flown from Bellingen to see Lake Eyre, provided the evenings entertainment of poetry and singing. This was a great evening.

It was here we first saw what must be an outback phenomenon of circling of the wagons, where even with space to spare, people parked as close as possible and then surrounded their vans with vehicles. We are not sure which predator was of concern.

The next day we flew over Lake Eyre. It really is a fantastic sight, with water. Lake Eyre is the worlds largest internally draining system. Normally it is a salt pan.  It fills infrequently mostly from floods in Queensland this year from floods in the Georgina River. When it fills it is a mecca for birds and humans.  Because the floods came late in the season less birds came to breed, although the air was quite busy with flights from Marree, William Creek, Birdsville and elsewhere.

Maree alone averaged thirty departures a day.


The Lake Eyre Yacht Club at Marree is a triumph of optimism. The Commodore had a two week cruise this year.





We also flew over the Marree Man, a 4.2 km tall man ploughed into the desert, making him the world's largest artwork.

There is a great deal of speculation about the originator of this Artwork and theories abound. Some believe it was the Americans then based at Woomera because they had access to GPS tracking, although this seems unlikely as they would have found it hard to have 3 months of spare time required to do the plowing.

 

 

A former policeman we met in Coober Pedy believes it was a local "bushie" from the Roxby Downs area, rich enough to have a bulldozer and GPS, but it seems unlikely the truth will ever be known.

Arkaroola - 24 & 25 July 2009

We left Beltana heading for Arkaroola, one of the best known locations in the Northern Flinders Ranges.

On the way we called in at Iga Warta an information centre owned by the Adnyamathanha people.Their display enables you to learn some of their history in the area.

Arkaroola [http://www.arkaroola.com.au] was established and built by Reg Sprigg in the 1970’s when he took over the lease of Arkaroola Station. Arkaroola comes from the Adnyamathanha word Arkaroo meaning a mythical monster. The owners refer to it as an ark for the flora, fauna and rocks of the area, and they have done a lot of work to eradicate feral goats, rabbits and camels. This private sanctuary was one of the first true ecotourism ventures in Australia.

Dr. Reg Sprigg was a rock star [geologist] who first came to the area as part of the wartime Manhattan Project, to reactivate the Radium Hill Uranium Mining field and to regionally map the Mt Painter Uranium field.

He made many important discoveries, the most significant being the world’s first multi celled organisms which left an imprint on the sedimentary rock in the Ediacara Hills. These organisms have been dated at 620 million years old. Their discovery has led to the naming of a new era the Ediacaran era.

Arkaroola is now a period piece from the 1970’s. It is attractive and comfortable. We enjoyed the Native Pine restaurant and did the Ridgetop Tour which is a fantastic way to see the unique geology of the area from the comfort of a 4wd. Their tyres last about 4,000kms on the very steep rocky roads so we were glad it was not our Landcruiser doing the tour.

This road was built by the uranium prospectors and Exoil. The views are fantastic and it is obvious why Reg Sprigg wanted to preserve it.

The mining companies have left behind a lot of good tracks. Nowadays prospecting is done by helicopter [a dangerous job as they fly within 3 or 4 meters of the slope amongst strong updrafts] and also by analyzing the leaves of deep rooted plants. The plants roots bring minerals to the surface and what is below can be inferred by the trace elements in their leaves. Although it seems unlikely that the Government would allow mining on Arkaroola mining companies are still prospecting.

Confirming our ability to tow rain clouds behind the caravan, it rained overnight. Not a lot, but enough to settle the dust for our drive to Maree.

Beltana Homestead - 16 to 23 July 2009

From Wilpena we drove to Blinman and then towards Leigh Creek.

Blinman is yet another copper mining town.

It has survived the closing of the mine to become a way stop for those going North, proving that good coffee and clean toilets will keep any town going. There is an excellent cafe 'The Wild Lime Cafe" with great coffee and exotic pies such as Red Curry Kangaroo.

Driving from Blinman we saw a sign for Beltana Homestead and enquired if we could stay for the night, which we did.

  

That evening we drove the 45kms south to the Prairie Hotel in Parachilna, to eat what they call “Feral Cuisine.”

 

 

John had the "Road Kill Grill" comprising Kangaroo and Emu fillets and Camel sausage. Tricia more conservatively ate the National Coat of Arms, starting with Emu Pate and Wattle Seed lavosh and finishing with grilled kangaroo. The food was great.

Beltana is 463,000 acres of working sheep and cattle station, very significant in the development of outback Australia and now on the Historic Register.

It is the Station where Elders Pastoral Company started. Sir Thomas Elder, the second owner, imported the first Camels and Beltana became one of the most successful breeding studs and largest depots for camels in Australia. The camels were very useful in opening up the very dry inland with their Indian [colloquially known as Afghan] camel drivers.

In 1875 Ernest Giles’ Expedition set off from the Homestead to find an overland route to Perth.  He succeeded but failed to find the rich grazing lands so no reward for him.

We found the Homestead with its 1860 vintage shearers quarters shown here, an ideal base for exploring the surrounding region, so stayed for the week. Evenings brought Graham the owner and the other hands back to the workshop next to the shearing shed, where the days activities were discussed. Sunset brought an amazing stillness as we lit the evening fire to cook dinner and watched the stars, so bright and clear that at first even well known constellations such as the Southern Cross seemed unfamiliar, surrounded as they are by many more stars than we are used to seeing.

Over the following days we visited Beltana Township, another historic copper town. Although largely abandoned, some is preserved, including significant buildings such as the Victoria Hotel, shown left and a Nursing home started by the Australian Inland Mission. In 1911 Beltana was briefly the Parish of John Flynn who took two fledgling and unproven technologies, the pedal radio and the aeroplane and melded them to form the Flying Doctor Service thus bringing medical care to isolated communities. This was his church. He was a superintendant of the Australian Inland Mission and his vision was to have a hospital and nursing home within 100 miles of the place of residence of every outback woman and child.

Beltana was for a while the railhead for the first Ghan railway and a repeater station for the overland Telegraph which went via Adelaide and Darwin to London. The main north road went through the town. Realignment of the railway and the road and closure of the mine meant it no longer had a reason for being.

The following day we hiked to Blinman Pools, which were reached from Angorichina after a 5km rock scramble, made harder because of the recent rains.

On the 20th we decided to drive the 4wd track to Lake Torrens.  This went well until we came to the third and final sand hill blown across the track and failed to traverse it, getting ourselves bogged.

After two hours of digging to no avail we contacted the Homestead and two of the station hands came to tow us out so we could continue on our trip to the lake. It shows the value of having radio and phone contact with the station, as it was not hard to imagine how isolated and helpless we would have been without the ability to get help. It is not surprising the unprepared die in this country every year.

The next day after that excitement, we had a very sedate walk around historic Blinman. Tricia had emu pie for lunch this time.

 

We drove back through Glass Gorge which has stunning vies of Wilpena Pound and the Flinders Ranges.

 

The following day we did the 4wd track to Puttapa Springs.  Puttapa Station is the home of the Ragless family.  Graham Ragless now owns both Puttapa and Beltana Stations and runs them as a combined operation with his wife Laura. 

 

We enjoyed our time at Beltana, the historic buildings, still in use today, the varied landscapes and particularly the chance to see the rhythm of the working day for those who live on the Station and to learn how an operation like this runs and survives despite the harsh and challenging environment.