Monday 18th August

Monday 18^th August 2014

I woke up late and had promised myself a run so struggled out of bed with my muscle grizzles. The van bed is too soft for me.

The day was a pearler – blue sky and sunshine and not much wind. I got my jogging stuff together and out I went. My legs however felt heavy and there isn’t much of a place to go running at Oodnadatta as the sides of the roads have stones that hurt your feet when run on – and there’s not much bitumen. But jog as best I could I did and found the old railway station, which is a museum, and the last of the old Ghan railway line that was interesting. Not the longest run, after waving hello to the garbage men on the same route as me and the local copper returning to his police station, there wasn’t anyone much around.

Back at camp, Greg was busy lashing the firewood to the back of the caravan – hope its still there tonight after going up more corrugated roads. I had to go have a shower in the amenities block to save our water. I don’t like showering in caravan parks any more – not that I liked it in the first place but now I am spoiled with having one in the van. It’s a bit of a wild shower too!

The amenities block was very old and so were the showers. They were however very clean. The shower head was so blocked up that when turned on you got a steady dribble from one end and about 4 little squirts the other, making it difficult to rinse off all the soap and I daresay that I used more water in this inefficient way of water flow. However, I emerged clean – which was the whole point of the exercise.

The camp kitchen was obviously a stable that had been converted. It had lots of character and power points!! Also a kettle, microwave and toaster of which 2 of the 4 slots worked. Greg fetched his coffee machine for a coffee and we made toast out of the now stale bag of bread in the fridge which now consisted of lots of crusts and a few slices now classified ‘toast only’ as we hadn’t had fresh bread in days.

After this gourmet delight we ventured back to the Pink Roadhouse for some advice. We wanted to know whether the pained desert was a day trip away and close enough that you could get back to Oodnadatta after photographing the sunset. The answer was yes but it’s probably better to stay at Arkaringa Station, which is only a few kilometers from the range. We had unhitched Gibson ready to leave him at camp for a day trip but now changed our minds and rehitched, getting ready to tackle the dirt roads again.

We topped up with diesel at $2.25 per litre and set off. The Oodnadatta track is quite wide even though it had pockets of terrible road surface, after what was supposed to be 40 km but is closer to 50 and I was starting to panic that we had gone the wrong way, we found the turn off to the Painted Desert and the Homestead. Hooray. She said to travel 40 km down the Oodnadatta road and turn off to the station which is a further 30km. However it was more like 50km down the Oodnadatta road and 40km to the homestead. I was ready to have a panic attack thinking we were on the wrong road. This road was half the width of the Oodnadatta road and windier. And ten times more bumpy and corrugated. At one point, there was so much dust flying behind me as the wind was blowing it over the driver’s side that I could hardly see anyone coming – and unfortunately we had a dickhead with a camper trailer who didn’t radio and just tried to pass me on a bend in a creek bed. I had just gone through a really corrugated part that shook us so badly that we jiggled across the road. And then on my inside was this fool over taking with barely enough room. Dangerous impatient idiot. He can have flat tyres along with Mr Rude from Coober Pedy. 

Well with that fright gone, it was time to test more of my driving skills as the road went into and followed a dry creek bed. The surface was just sand and stones, overhanging trees and you had to make sure you kept going steady as you would have bogged in them. Like a creek bed, it wasn’t straight and I had to really keep on my toes to not get stuck. I did it ! On the other side, down the road a bit we were rewarded by the most magnificent view of part of the painted desert. Not massive hills, they are sandstone I suppose and full of colour – so pretty - so we pulled of on the side of the road to take a few photos. About 5km on from here we found the viewing area for the other part of the painted desert. We turned up the look out road and I thankfully parked Gibson where we could safely turn around. There were other people there further up but they looked like they had finished walking and were packing up.

We had a nice little time taking photos of the pretty hills and then decided to press on to the homestead and book in, unhitch and come back at sunset with warmer clothes and a heap more camera gear.

We found the homestead Arkaringa Station about 6km up the road. Rebecca the station person. She was really friendly, greeted us and it was $20 to stay there – no power but they had flushing loos and hot showers. Greg had a snooze while I tried in vain to keep up the blog and then I packed the gin and tonic, 2 cups and a packet of BBQ shapes and we set out about 4.45pm to catch the sunset  - loaded to the teeth with cameras and tripods.

 

sun setting on the gibber plains

A brave plant with a little pink flower in the desert

the road out of the station

We found a place that would make the most of the setting sun around the colours and it wasn’t the viewing platform – where everyone else went so we set up there. Greg took out the Gigapan and a landscape camera, he had 2 other 35mm digitals and I had my own camera. He set up all the gear and got it ready. It was like watching a precision operation in progress so I kept out of the way. I did busy myself though with taking photos of other things which were interesting like the play of light on the native grasses and rocks and the little waterways left after recent rains. Eventually though the sun started to set in earnest so Greg started up the Gigipan and I poured Gin and tonic and opened the shapes. Always helpful.

Painted desert before the sunset

We cheers’d the sunset and the day and the holiday and enjoyed nature’s lightshow, taking the odd shot now and again. Eventually though the whole lot of hills were in shadow so we packed up and went home, letting all the others who were at the lookout go first so we could take our time. We were a bit tired.

We had dinner and went to bed as the next day we were on the road again back to Oodnadatta and hoped to get there by 11am so we could refuel and push on to Mount Dare.