bloggerooni: South Australia

Now that I’ve passed through SA, I think it should be called ‘the State of Superlatives’, as it was full of ‘the largest, most isolated, oldest, biggest etc’, and it sure was impressive. So much to see here, and amazing. As soon as we crossed the border from NSW, the tedious, flat landscape started to get more interesting. A few mountain ranges started to appear here and there, and there were a few turns in the road! Still flat and huge expanses, but like driving through a painting. Early SA was an indication of what was to come, and it was gorgeous.

The Flinders Ranges

Considered one of Australia’s oldest (there’s the first one!) landscapes, our first glimpse of the Flinders looked a little like a stegosaurus’s back, with its jagged, angled peaks. So many layers of colour and tone. Just stunning.

Melrose

This was our first stop after Broken Hill, and what a gorgeous little place it was. Immaculately kept, it is the oldest ‘town’ (now hamlet, at a push), in The Flinders, dating back to the 1840’s when it was a copper mining town. Again, an innovative little community, that seems to have its creativity at the forefront of the businesses there. The ‘North Star Hotel’ is a great example of this, where they’ve converted old trucks into accommodation – so clever…

This truck actually did crash into a tree when it was still operating. They’ve just moved it, and positioned it to look like that’s what happened here, on site.

Inside the ‘green truck’.

and inside ‘the North Star Hotel’ – very cool!

And I fell in love with the old brewery! Want to do it up and live in it – like a castle!! Fires the imagination it does!

A couple of other old buildings in Melrose…

blacksmith’s

not sure what this was.

Alligator Gorge

Just up the road from Melrose, is where Elliot and I did our first hike. It was beautiful. Part of the Flinders Ranges, and very tranquil.

Through “the Narrows’

‘The Terraces’ (formed naturally by a river)

Trees growing horizontally out of the rocks, as it’s a source of soil that gets trapped in the cracks. Think this might be a Sugar Gum.

And saw a couple of pairs of this gorgeous bird – a Scarlet Robin I think.

Kanyaka Homestead

These ruins were amazing, and beautifully restored. Gave you a taste of what life may have been like on a very large sheep station back in the 1870’s/80’s, before it was abandoned due to drought. This was our first taste of how bad the flies are in this part of the world. They thrive in dry heat, and were ballistic!!! Anyway, the homestead, a little eerie, but wonderful anyway…

The map shows how many rooms there were, just in the main building. The Homestead was so big and prosperous in its day, it also served as the post office.

The Homestead from afar

see plan/map above to see what these rooms may have been.

The old shearing sheds in ‘the Woolshed’.

Wilpena Pound

This was our next stop, and was fabulous too. Had our first night of a slight sprinkle of rain! It was also our first night of having campfires under a blanket of stars, plus very hungry kangaroos/wallabies, who loved paper so much, they’d often just go into the toilet cubicles and drag the toilet paper out, eating it on the way. They ate all of someone’s magazines they’d left out, and two of my large cardboard boxes I was using for storage!! I suppose they are tree derivatives!

Anyway, Wilpena Pound is a huge crater rim, and due to having only one narrow channel to access the bowl, was considered by sheep farmers to be a natural holding ‘pound’ for their flocks; hence the name. Again, beautiful scenery, and history too. The pioneering folks back then sure had it tough, but I guess, they were lured by the whiff of fortune from mining or farming, and made their choices accordingly.

Wilpena Pound is something like 8kms across and 15kms long.

the old homestead in the Pound.

On to Marree

It was mother’s day when we headed off to our next stop. We travelled to Blinham, then Parachilna via our first dirt road (did my first ‘creek crossing!!’ – very exciting!), and nearly ran out of petrol in the middle of nowhere L.

Had lunch in the very funky ‘Prairie Hotel’, which was great, but think that place must have the highest population of flies in the world!! Swarms of them!!

The hotel is about the only thing that exists in Parachilna. So remote!

Then onto Marree. Now, Marree was not on our itinerary, and it ended up being a ‘happy accident’. We pulled in to Marree for a break from driving, and it was already a little late. So I was deliberating about whether or not to keep going after my cuppa. SO glad we didn’t and stayed in Marree. And a valuable lesson to be reminded of that you can’t judge a book by its cover. You see, Marree is not particularly nice – a little ramshackle, ‘no horse town’ kinda place, heaving with flies, but as it turned out, the locals were really friendly and generous. The publican had only recently bought the hotel (again, the ‘hub’ of the town) and moved there from Canberra.

And the barman was from Essex, but had been educated at Harrow (extremely posh school in England). He was an interesting fella. Anyway, we were made to feel very at home, and were gently persuaded to take a scenic flight over Lake Eyre. Again, this wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t stayed there. The flight was incredible. In an hour and a half, in a little 6 seater plane, we only flew over about 1/6^th of the Lake. Even with an aerial view, I couldn’t get my head around the sheer scale of the place. I think it’s the biggest lake in Australia (eventhough there was no water in it when we saw it), and about the size of Holland. Even bigger than that though, is Anna Creek station – the biggest property in the world (approximately the size of Belgium), which pretty much dwarfs Lake Eyre. Collosal sizes, that is too hard to comprehend. Flying over Lake Eyre was like looking at the surface of the moon, with the gleaming white salt crust surface disappearing into the distance. Add this to your bucket list!! Well worth it!

Strips of green where water is/has been most recently

The shore of Lake Eyre. Can't believe they graze cattle on this land.

There’s no water in Lake Eyre at the moment. It was full about 3 years ago, and when full is about 6 meters deep. It evaporates at about 2 metres per year, as it is between two deserts.

William Creek to Coober Pedy

This was our next stop. We’d been travelling on dirt roads from Parachilna pretty much, which is even more taxing driving, and it takes ages to get anywhere. William Creek consisted of a hotel and campsite. That was it.

There’d been a bit of rain a few days before, and the road had been closed, only opening up to 4WDs the day after our overnight stay at William Creek. We decided to take the chance, and headed off on the 160km drive to Coober Pedy. Well, that drive took us nearly 5 and a half hours! We got bogged, and had to be pulled out by 2 4WDs! Again, lucky – getting bogged was an experience, but our rescuers (fellow travellers), were lovely people who we caught up with a few times in Coober Pedy, and had one of the best pizzas we’ve ever had on our last night in Coober Pedy. So happy all round!!

Passed through ‘The Dog Fence’ on the way, the longest fence in the world at 5614kms, built to keep dingoes out of southern flocks.

This is what the land looked like the whole way, and what Anna Creek Station keep their cattle on. No idea how they do it – it’s desert!

Bogged!

Coober Pedy

Both Elliot and I loved this place! So cool and quirky! Don’t think you’d find anywhere like it in the world. It’s the largest opal mining location in the world, and, because it’s in the desert, most of the houses and buildings are either underground, or carved into the hills – called ‘dug outs’. We did a really interesting tour with the guy who ran the campsite, and just loved the place. The thing that really struck me was the golf course – 18 holes, with the ‘greens’ being some kind of black ash. Tee offs were a patch of Astroturf, fairways were gravel strips, and ‘interesting features’ on the course were piles of dirt held up by layers of old tyres! It was awesome!! We were told it’s the only club in the world that is affiliated with St Andrews golf course in Scotland. I thought it’d be a great idea to have a charity golf drive out there (pun comes in handy too!), as it’s so unusual. I’d also like to see some of the golf pros give it a go. All in all, an incredible place, and lots of fun.