Off To the Flinders Ranges

 Today the outback part of our adventure begins, as we leave Clare after an enjoyable two days and head North to the Flinders Ranges. There are two main options for routes to take and we opt for the slightly longer one through Quorn, as we have done part of the other route previously.

 

It is a good sealed road all of the way to Wilpena Pound, passing through many small farming villages and a few larger towns.

 

Our first stop was in Wirrabara, to see a fine example of Silo Art, which seems to be popping up more frequently.

 

 

Soon we were back on the road and had a comfort stop in Wilmington, a small town with a wide main street, excellent  new rest rooms and an electric car charging station  ( installed by SA Government) outside the rest rooms ?

Wilmington main street

Electric Vehicle charger (not particularly busy today)

 

It is time to try our luck to get a cup of decent coffee and from what I have read about Quorn, we should be in luck there. Fortunately there was a choice of cafes, so we chose the closest, The Quandong Café and had a good cup of coffee and shared some of the local delicacy, quandong pie.

 

 

We arrived at Hawker in the lower Flinders Ranges at around 12.30pm, refueled (not sure about diesel price and availability as we progress so will keep topped up) and stopped for lunch at a very modern looking café Flinders Food Co. It was quite busy and had basic food, but enough to keep us going.

Flinders Food Co.

 

Wilpena Pound is now less than an hour away, so we decide to call in there to get a feel for the place before going on to our accommodation for the next three days.

 

There are a few lookouts along the way where start to get views of the mountains surrounding the pound. 

 

 

After taking the turnoff to the resort we found a carpark and headed into the Visitors Centre, to get some information about what to see and do and understand what facilities were available. To our great surprise the staff there largely ignored us, we collected a few maps and wandered off hoping we may gain some knowledge by trial and error.

 

Fortunately, we were greeted with much more enthusiasm at the IGA supermarket that adjoined the visitors centre. They had a good range of basic products at reasonable prices. We picked up a couple of essentials and put them in the car.

Visitors Centre and IGA Supermarket

 

Time was not under pressure so we looked at the list of walks that were shown on a map we picked up and decided to do the shortest one which was called “drought Busters Hike” on the map we had. It was only around 2 km and recommended timing was 2 hrs. once we found the trail head, the name of the walk had changed to “Boom or Bust” , but it seemed to be the same walk.  It basically involved a walk through the bed of Wilpena Creek, which must be massive when they get sustained rainfall.

 

By the look of the debris in the creek bed, the water flow through here must be substantial

 

Leaving the creek bed the walk then takes us up towards the escarpment, including a fairly sustained climb.

We are now out of the river gums and heading up the hill

 

It is a rough old walking trail with plenty of loose rocks

Walking back to the trail head we can hear the sound of a goat bleating. We looked up to where the noise was coming from and sure enough, we saw a large wild goat standing on the hilltop looking for someone.

 

Along the walk were signboards explaining how flora and fauna coped with the flood and drought conditions that cycle through this region through La Nina and El Nino years. Unfortunately, many of the signs were unreadable as they had been completely bleached by the harsh sun experienced here.

 

Eventually we arrived back at the visitors centre, having read some of the literature we had helped ourselves to on our first visit. We saw that there was a shuttle bus that would take you part of the way to Wilpena Pound viewing area, reducing the wak by around 2 km each way. Alas, when enquiring about it at the visitors centre (this time there was a woman there who was interested in helping us), the shuttle bus is not operating because they can’t get a driver.

 

It seems there was little to be gained by pursuing anything further, so will come back tomorrow morning and walk it instead.

 

Anyway, it was time to move on to Skytrek Willow Springs where we are staying. It is an operating livestock farm, (beef and sheep), that has expanded into proving accommodation for tourists in cabins, caravans or tents. We are booked into the Jillaroo’s Cottage which is a self contained prefab caravan park “cabin” that was relocated  from Point Turtin (Yorke Peninsula) in 2018. It is well set up with a kitchen, dining main bed in a common space, and a bathroom and a couple of extra bunks we don’t need in the far end behind a sliding door.

Jillaroo's Hut

 

Checking in here, once we found the caretakers cottage, was a breeze. All of the information we were seeking from the Visitors Centre at Wilpena Pound was readily available here. We have been supplied with maps, recommendations on where to go and what to see and a few thoughts on what we might do on our trip from here to Parachilna when we leave. It seems complaints about the Visitors Centre are very common.

 

Anyway, we are now well placed to fill the next few days with lots of things to do.

 

Life at Willow Springs is isolated. We are self catering for meals for the next 3 days, there is no mobile phone service, but there apparently is WiFi available at the camp kitchen. So if you receive this blog post on time, it came from the camp kitchen, which is quite close to our cabin.

 

There are 6 campsite areas on the property and the one nearest us has 3 caravans and a couple of tents in residence.