Ron & Anne's adventure: It's a long long way to the loo.....

The Oodnadata track, apart from being famous as a long distance outback track, has two other claims to fame. Firstly, as I have previously mentioned, for most of its length it follows the Old Ghan railway course, and there are still many remnants of the days when it was almost the only way of getting around the centre of Australia. But secondly, perhaps more importantly, it follows the track that John McDoual Stuart pioneered during his many quests to find a route to northern shores. Within ten years the overland telephone line also followed the same route.

But more of that later. We discovered last evening that Marree was recently the film set for a new movie starring Guy Pearce and Rob Pattinson called The Rover. It was described to us as a post –apocalyptic Mad Max. So we’ll look out for that.

Our first landmark having left Marree is the old dog fence, which runs for about 9600 kms, built to keep dingoes and feral dogs in the north and sheep in the south safe from predators. I’m not sure how successful it was, as maintaining a fence that long is a mammoth task in itself.

A lot of the signs by the way were erected by the Pink Roadhouse at Oodnadata, probably the most famous roadhouse in Australia, and known throughout the world.

Further along we came to Mutonia Sculpture Park, which is commonly known as ‘Planehenge’, you can see why in this picture.

These planes were brought up from Melbourne for this display. There are many other scrap sculptures there, including a dog made from an old Ghan water tank. I’ll add a few pics at the end.

Lake Eyre is Australia’s lowest point, some 12mtrs below sea level, and is currently dry. The lake fills on average only three times each century, the last time about eight years ago, when a cyclone reached well into the hinterland of Queensland, filling the rivers which disappear into the lake, a catchment area of almost a quarter of mainland Australia.

Most of the time it is just a salt flat, and in 1964 Sir Malcolm Campbell set a new world land speed record here. We pass by South Lake Eyre, just one sixth of the size of the main lake which lies to the north of here.

The Old Ghan railway, so called because it follows the trail of the Afghan cameleers who serviced the area before this section of the railway was built in 1888, has left many relics along its path, and at Curdimurkha siding there is a section of rail and some old buildings, as well as a water tower and purifier. As the only water out here is bore water, which comes from the Great Artesian Basin below the desert here, it is full of lime, and would quickly damage the boilers of the old steam trains. So it had to be softened chemically, and the towers performed that job. Believe it or not, this is the site of the bi-annual Curdimurkha outback ball, which thousands of tail coated and evening dressed revelers attend, hundreds of miles from almost anywhere!

‘Blanche Cup’ and the ‘Bubbler’ are just two of the many mound springs along the track. They are formed by escaping water from the ‘Great Artesian Basin’ over many thousands of years and are a lush environment surrounded by vast deserts.

It was only because of these mound springs, which are dotted along here for many miles, that John Stuart was able to explore the centre and make his way north, using aboriginal trackers to show the way.

Just a little further north from there is Coward Springs, which boasts a warm spa made from old railway sleepers. A beautiful oasis, with palm trees, birdlife and wetland ponds, we had intended to camp here for the night, however within a few minutes the flies had driven us off, there were millions of them just waiting to cover every inch of exposed skin, despite the potions we liberally splashed all over ourselves!

William Creek is just a few miles further on so we decided to make that our base for the night. There is nothing here but a road house, a campsite and an airport. The flies are little better here, but at least we can get a cabin to get away from them! It is at the centre of the largest cattle station in Australia, Anna Creek (currently 24,000 Sq Kms) and was originally part of Sydney Kidmans empire, which in 1910 stretched from the Gulf of Carpentaria to Port Augusta, a distance of 3500 kms, covering 90 stations and almost 340,000 sq kms. The family is still involved in the company, although nowadays the empire is a little smaller.