Arkaroola and the Gammon Ranges

We've had a couple of weeks without phone or WiFi access so there's a bit of catching up to do on our travels.

Arkaroola is about 200kms from Wilpena on the northern edge of the Gammon Ranges.  Of the next 1,000km we are to travel only about 40km is on sealed roads.  We travelled to Arkaroola via the Bunkers Conservation Reserve.  This was a pleasant drive on a good quality unsealed road.  Some rain a couple of months earlier means that the opportunistic plants are flowering.  At one point we drove over a crest to see Lake Frome in the distance.  Lake Frome is the 4th largest lake in Australia after Lake Eyre, Lake Torrens and Lake Gairdner.  The lake is dry at the moment and the sun reflected bright white off the salt flats.

The Gammon Ranges are very different to the more southerly Flinders Ranges.  The rocks here are some 800 - 900 million years old - that's VERY OLD!!  Arkaroola and its surrounding areas are a geologist's paradise.  Arkaroola Village is a privately run complex just outside the Vulkathunha-Gammon Ranges National Park with plenty of accommodation options and activities.  There's also a small museum with plenty of information about the area.  Near the entrance to Arkaroola Village is a collection of rocks from the area.  There are all manner of rocks here - igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic.  The area is also rich in many minerals, including uranium, and over the years there have been many mining ventures, although they have all ceased due to the difficulty of mining and transportation from this rugged and remote area. We saw many types of ore including uranium lodestone and white asbestos (the good, well bound type, not the dangerous, fibrous type).  Many of the rocks are iridescent under UV light - showing brilliant colours, blue, green, red, yellow and orange.

We booked into the caravan park for 4 nights and also paid to do the World Famous Ridge Top Tour (more about that later).    As the sun dropped, the golden light lit up the surrounding hills.  In the darkness we were able to sit outside and  look at the stars.

The next day we boarded the 4WD truck for the Ridge Top Tour.  This had been recommended to us by a few people and we're really pleased we did it.  We spent the next 4 1/2 hours bouncing along the rough tracks up and down the ancient rocky ridges.  The scenery was stunning - and rugged.  We took plenty of photos, a difficult task due to the very bumpy ride.  We wouldn't hesitate to recommend this tour to anyone going to Arkaroola.

We stopped at Coulthard Lookout to look back at Arkaroola Village and Mt Oliphant (name after Sir Mark Oliphant, Governor of SA in the 1970s, a member of the Manhattan Project in the 1940s and first president of the Australian Academy of Science), and then proceeded further into the Arkaroola - Mt Painter Wilderness Sanctuary.

We bounced past Mt Painter where the ashes of Reg Sprigg and his wife Griselda (the original owners of the property) were scattered.  Finally we arrived at the spectacular Sillers Lookout.  From Sillers Lookout we could see the Beverley Uranium Mine and out to Lake Frome in the distance.

Photos just don't capture the grandeur of this area - you really need to see it.

In the evening the village was inundated by athletes.  40 teams of 4 local and international athletes together with their organisers and supporters are due to begin a race from Arkaroola to Pt Augusta.  The XPD - more an expedition than a race - is held about every 18 months and this time it's SA's turn.  The 750km race incorporates running (orienteering), cycling, kayaking and rope work - with a 10 day time limit.  Participants carry everything they will need in a backpack and, armed with a map and compass, they set off through the bush towards pre-established checkpoints.  The elite athletes are expected to finish the race in 3 1/2 days with the final team due in 9 days.  The race began at 9am the following morning with a warm up run across a couple of ridges and within 30 minutes the first teams arrived at the village to collect their maps and set off towards their first checkpoints.

After we saw off the runners we got into our car to do some exploring.  First stop was The Pinnacles, volcanic plugs of hard rock left behind when the softer rock eroded around them.  This area was widely explored by Douglas Mawson and the valley around The Pinnacles is called Mawsons Valley.  On our way back to the main track we came across a quandong (native peach) tree covered in ripe fruit.  We relieved it of some fruit which Cherryl stewed up later in the afternoon - it's one of our favourites with cream or ice-cream. 

Next stop was the 19th century copper smelter.  This is mostly ruins and ironically the newer brick smelters which are still standing were never used.

Then it was on to the Arkaroola Waterhole, a permanent water source in a lovely rocky gorge.  We drove back to the campground crossing many dry river beds.

While driving around we came across several "monuments" which had aboriginal dreamtime stories on them.

In the evening we booked into the Observatory Tour run by Arkaroola Village.  There are 2 observatories with powerful 14inch telescopes to look at the heavens.  The area is ideally suited to astronomy as there is almost no light pollution and skies are usually clear of clouds.  In the cool of the evening we were able to gaze at Saturn and see its rings clearly.  We saw a number of other celestial bodies - the Swan Nebula, Alpha Centauris (our nearest stellar neighbour 4.3 light years away) and a globular cluster.  We could also pick out the "Emu in the Sky" in the Milky Way.

In the morning we packed up and headed to Leigh Creek, the last shopping stop before we ventured onto the Oodnadatta Track.

The Flinders Ranges - WOW!!!

Our two day drive from Broken Hill in NSW to the Flinders Ranges in South Australia was uneventful.  We stopped at the plant quarantine checkpoint at Oodia Wirra near Peterborough and offloaded our potatoes and onions to the inspector - we had dealt with all the fruit earlier.  South Australia has very strict quarantine rules and pretty much all fruit and vegetables need to be disposed of (we were able to keep our carrots and sweet potatoes).  We overnighted at a roadside camp a few kms north of Peterborough.  While we were there we saw several vehicles from the 2013 Variety Club Rally.  They were all decked out with decorations and flags.  Unfortunately they passed too quickly for us to get any photos.

The next day we drove through the towns of Orroroo and Hawker into the Flinders Ranges National Park.  It's almost 40 years since we last camped here - with a 3 month old baby and a pup tent!  Things have certianly changed since 1973.  The facilities at the Wilpena Resort are very good.  It's run by the SA Parks and Wildlife Service and has excellent facilities for both campers and "ordinary" tourists with plenty of campsites and other accommodation.  There's a well stocked general store, a good restaurant (we had dinner one night in the bistro with another couple also going to the Bushtracker Owner Group Muster in Alice Springs), fuel and a dump point.  We have a large bushy campsite with power and water just outside of Wilpena Pound.  There are plenty of campers around, but it's not at all crowded.  We're constantly entertained by the birdlife - emus, apostlebirds, native mynahs and beautiful green lorikeets.  We picked up a booklet "Discover Hawker and the Flinders Ranges" at the Hawker General Store.  The $2 we paid is donated to the RFDS.  We've used this booklet a lot as it has plenty of useful information.

The big drawcard for the Flinders Ranges is the scenery - only one word for it -  SPECTACULAR.  Our cameras have been working overtime.  We've been for several drives, through gorges, along riverbeds, along the flat plains and up many lookouts.  As well as the well marked drives there are plenty of walks - short and long.

Not far from Wilpena, through the cypress pine forests, is the Sacred Canyon with indigenous engravings in the rock walls.  The engravings indicate waterholes/springs, emus, kangaroos and windbreaks.

A little further on are the Hucks Lookout and Stokes Hill Lookout with commanding views.  At Stokes Hill there is a bronze relief of Wilpena Pound and surrounding area which puts everything into perspective.  Wilpena Pound is an anticline about 40km long and 10km wide and is surrounded by peaks over 1,000m high on its steep walls.  St Mary's Peak, at 1,171m is the highest peak in the Flinders Ranges.

After lunch we ventured south, stopping at the Rawnsley Lookout with views over Arkaroo Rock and Rawnsley Station (the station has a Top Tourist Caravan Park) and the Elder Range Lookout.  A bit further south we turned right onto the Moorlana Scenic Drive through Arkaba and Merna Mora Stations.  The drive took us between the Elder Range and Wilpena Pound to the Stuart Highway. 

 After about 25km on the highway we turned back into the mountains along the Brachina Gorge Geological Trail.  We travelled along dry river beds through the Brachina Gorge between rock walls 500 - 580 million years old.  We saw plenty of bush camping sites along the way - filed away for future use....  We made our way back to our caravan via Bunyeroo Gorge, along more riverbeds.  Although the afternoon drive was only about 100km it took us about 3 hours.

Friday we drove to the nearby town of Blinman, about 55km away.  The Great Wall of China is about halfway and its rocky outcrops really do resemble a cotinuous wall on top of the hills.  When we arrived at Blinman the town was full of campervans and motorhomes - about 60 of them are on a safari to the Birdsville races.  We managed to order our coffees before the crowd and bought a couple of home made quandong (wild peach) pies to take away.  Blinman is an old mining town and there are several mines in the area as well as some ruins from the 1860s vintage buildings.

Then it was back into gorge country as we drove through the wildflowers to Glass Gorge and on to the Prairie Hotel at Parachilna for lunch.  At the pub you can order emu, camel and kangaroo for lunch.  We had kangaroo burgers - delicious and very filling.  The pub is also a gallery for local art and craft and there are some lovely paintings, rugs and cushion covers for sale.

After lunch we completed our round trip back to Blinman via the Parachilna Gorge and Angorichina Village.  A coffee stop at the Wild Lime Cafe and Gallery with its huge peppercorn tree outside and artworks under the plastic tablecloths and then we were on our way back to camp - a day well spent.


The next morning dawned clear and sunny after a night of rain.  Everything is clean and shiny as the dust has been washed off the trees.  We've had a quick trip into Hawker, 55 km south, because we've picked up a stone which has punctured a tyre and we have a slow leak - probably while we were driving along the river beds in the gorges.  It's good to know that the tyre pressure monitoring system on our car is working.  While we were getting the tyre repaired we struck up a conversation with the garage owner about the history of the town.  Cherryl's grandfather was a Methodist Minister in Hawker in 1931-1933.  We picked up a book about Methodism in the Hawker District - "Built With Living Stones" which he features in - more material for the family history collection.  It was interesting to find that he was instrumental in building a new church at nearby South Arkaba.

From our campground there's a walk into Wilpena Pound.  It's 3km to the Old Wilpena Homestead.  There's a shuttle from the Resort so you can ride the first 2km and then walk into the Pound. The shuttle will also bring you back the last 2km.  Once inside the Pound it's like a treed parkland.

Today is Father's Day, September 1st, and we're having a rest day before heading north to Arkaroola in the Gammon Ranges tomorrow.  The wildflowers  are fantastic - golden wattles lining the roads, huge clumps of white and yellow daisies, carpets of yellow, white, pink and purple flowers, bushes with red flowers and some bush tomatoes with their red berries.

We're expecting to see some Sturt Desert Peas as we venture north.