Cooper Creek Camp: We were a little later leaving camp this morning. Glen did an oil change last night and we needed to check that everything was okay before hitting the road. Today we travelled 255 klms. Our camp last night was on Cooper Creek which is 5 kilometres wide at this crossing. We travelled through the Natterannie Sand hills and past Mulka Store Ruins. Just before Mungerannie Hotel is the meeting place of three deserts. Tirari Dessert, Sturts Stony Desert and Simpson Desert.
While Glen was doing a quick check over the car, I found these beautiful flowers blooming. It is green everywhere and the recent rains that came across while we were in the Flinders has set the desert into early bloom for some flowers.
There is plenty of water lying around with lots of small lagoons and lakes.
Another of Tom Kruse’s vehicles – he probably went through quite a few considering how rough the track was when he delivered the mail. We went into the hotel for a look around and bought a couple of books. We got talking to the publican and he gave us a book on Farina as a gift-we were pretty happy with that.
The hotel and motel units, they even have a pool - artesian
It is quite hot – it would be around 40C – you would have to be very careful getting in, so that you didn’t disturb the hot water algae, but it would be relaxing. Below are the wetland from the bore run off water. There were lots of birds, but all of them were in the distance further along the wetland run off.
Inside the pub, everyone leaves something, a hat, a business card, a stubby holder, photo id drivers licence – whole collections of them.
Money on the wall. People’s pony tails – it must be something to do with the heat out here – the big question is why?? Even the publican wonders as well.
Further along the track is Mirra Mitti Bore – above left is the tapped well and above right coming out, you can see the heat coming off it. It meanders for a couple of hundred meters to cool down and into another wetland and stock watering point. I had to walk quite a long way before I could even put my hand in the water.
These are rare Acacia plants – Mt Gason Wattle Project – they grow no where else and they have some fenced from stock and rabbits and the other just from stock and the rest in the open trying to find out why there appears only to be adult plants and no seedlings.
They have some nasty little spikes on them.
This is the intersection of the Warburton Track – still a long way from anywhere.
The Birdsville Track is basically like a dirt highway. We passed quite a few off roaders travelling way too fast with camper trailers behind. We find that most of the people we speak to are on so a tight an agenda that they are basically driving from dawn to dusk each day like bats out of hell. There cant be any enjoyment in travelling these vast distances like that.
We decided to take the chance that we could get through on the inside track which is basically not used. It is impassable in the wet and is not maintained. There is no signage to show where the inside track breaks away from the outside track, but with our live map tracking we could identify it easily. We were expecting to see signage saying the track was closed, but haven’t seen anything, so will see how far we get or find a sign.
I saw some Egrets take to flight and walked back and found a water hole. All the pelicans took to the air as well. The ground is dry, it has had a week to dry out so we will see how we go. If we can get past the Goyder Lagoon sections where the water tends to lay, we should be right for the rest of the track. We have enough fuel on board to turn around and go back if we find ourselves unable to continue.
This is the track, the grass was as high as the bonnet in sections. Where the grass is growing is fine, it means that the soil is very dry underneath, where we found no plants we needed caution. We found several water crossings which we didn’t attempt to enter as it is pure mud with no hope of getting out of. We found dry bypass sections.
There were some guide posts as well. At one section there was a sign on the road for us to reduce speed – we were going so slow that the flies were pacing us and I had to use the gum leaf swat to keep them out of the car.
We flushed out lots of large quail and saw several grey falcons (birds)
We have camped along the track tonight. We thought that we had left the Goyder Lagoons black soil and have reached the first of the sand dune country, but viewing from our sand dune island, there is more black soil to come.
There is a cattle station about 20 kilometres north of here called Alton Downs and we hope that the road from there will be more frequently used.
In any case, we have left the dirt highway behind and are experiencing the true Birdsville Track which is very satisfying. Tom Kruse used the inner track and the outer track was only used in wet weather. The outer track is now the main route for most people using the track.
Today we crossed the Birdsville Stock Route and also the route taken by Charles Sturt in 1844-1846.
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