Tuesday, 10/23 Farina Ruins to Coward Springs - Oodnadatta Track

Ten Pound Poms warn us about loo frogs

     The evening before we had talked to an Aussie couple who emigrated to Oz from England around 40 years ago. Our new acquaintances called themselves '10 pound Poms'. Whether they arrived here 300 years ago with the First Fleet, or last week,English emigrants are called 'Poms' in Australia, which is believed to be an Ozification of the phrase Prisoners of His Majesty, the original term for the convicts shipped here in the 18^th century. It is a term both mocking and slightly derisive. Heard in conversation,

      “Me brother is a bloody Pom, but he's an OK bloke.”

     In the years after WWII the Australian government encouraged people from the Commonwealth to move to Oz with a program that charged only 10 pounds shipping fare a person in an attempt to increase the population of the country, thus the phrase 'ten pound poms'.

      During our conversation they told us about a most startling phenomenon. In northern parts, frogs will take up residence in toilets, hiding in the traps. At certain delicate times they will come out of their watery lair and jump up to land on your exposed southern parts, which they reported is a most alarming experience.

     That morning I was finishing up my morning toiletries and flushed. Watching, I was truly alarmed as I saw a small brown object climbing madly up the side of the bowl, fighting the current to keep himself from a terminal septic experience. As the whirlpool subsided, I realized I had just come very close to being kissed on my cheek by an Oz frog prince. Who knows what I might have turned into?

The Ghan Railroad; Tom Kruse, postman; Lake Eyre Yacht Club

     We packed up and left, heading north to Maree and the beginning of the famous Oodnadatta Track. The OT follows the route of an old narrow gauge Ghan railway that used to run from Port Augusta on the Spencer Gulf, which we visited a couple weeks ago, up to Alice Springs, but shut down in 1980 and replaced by a modern railway a several miles west. Now the route is dotted with occasional railway siding ruins.

Ruins

     Marree also has a few other noteworthy objects;

Tom Kruse's mail truck

Tom spent a lot of time behind the wheel of this truck

   Tom Kruse delivered the mail, and a lot of other essentials, with this truck through the outback. Kruse worked the Birdsville Track mail run from 1936 to 1957, driving this Leyland truck. He delivered mail and other supplies including general stores, fuel and medicine to remote stations from Marree to Birdsville in central Queensland, some 523 kilometres away. Each trip would take two weeks and he regularly had to manage break-downs, flooding creeks and rivers, and getting bogged in desert dunes.  And we thought we were on an adventure!

 Muslim Indian camel drivers from the 1890's
 built a mosque and worshiped here

 When it rains a lot up north, these guys get to sail on Lake Eyre,
which happens once every ten years or so

Ghan railroad engine

Who can resist ruins? And Planehenge? And Lake Eyre?

After Maree the Oodnadatta Track begins. It's a rough, corrugated, dusty, typical outback road. But there are some fun things along the way that make it worthwhile;

The start of about 300 miles of dirt and gravel roads

Planehenge

     Lake Eyre, pronounced 'Air', not Erie, as I had supposed, is a vast salt flat 45 feet below sea level that only occasionally holds waters. It drains nearly a fourth of Oz, and when filled is the 18^th largest Lake in the world. When we found it the surface was a snow-white crust of salt overlaying an oozing clay layer that threatened to suck our shoes off if we stood too long or walked too heavily.

Lake Eyre on the horizon

Self portrait in salt

We stalk the BBC

      Beginning the evening before at the Farina ruins, we noticed a small film crew of about 7 people appearing at many of the sites we visited. Finally at Lake Eyre we go to talk to one of them. Chris Tarrant, the first host of the original “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” in England, is filming a documentary of the extreme rail lines of the world that will be broadcast in December on the BBC. He is in Australia to cover the old Ghan line. At two different spots along our route we were asked nicely to move our car, and our corpora, to different locations to stay out of certain camera shots. We were not asked to be extras, although we were invited to join them for drinks at the roadhouse at William Creek. But that was further than we planned to travel that day, and besides, we're through with the film business!

Desert Springs

      Indigenous people, the Ghan railroad, and the towns along the Oodnadatta Track all depend on a line of springs that occur with some regularity in the desert due to a fortunate geological phenomenon that I don't remember nor wish to look up. Anyways, in some cases they form mounds as the minerals in the water are deposited and dust sticks to the slowly growing prominences. In the vast arid region the sight of lush green growth takes you by surprise.

Mound Springs

Something is bugging us

     We stayed at Coward Springs, which is a small oasis along the OT that has a simple campground. The draw is a small natural 'spa' that you can sit in and enjoy. We did enjoy it, until we got out near sunset, and felt our skin start to sting in numerous spots. We didn't speak of it to each other, but we both assumed it was related to the high mineral content of the 'spa', perhaps drying our skin as the water evaporated. We went back to the car and changed to dry clothes, and I began to work on getting dinner ready. Feeling a particularly strong patch of stinging on my wrist, I looked down and observed at least 20 tiny sand flies happily feasting on my skin. Yikes! I killed the lot of them, but realized that we were slowly being devoured by the midges, and by a cloud of mosquitoes that had appeared at sunset. Usually reluctant to use bug spray, I gladly doused every inch of exposed skin with 'Bushman Skin Repellant', which we had bought weeks before upon the recommendation of one of our new Aussie friends. It worked, although it did add a fairly stringent flavor to the beans and rice I fixed. We ate quickly and threw the dirty dishes into the LC, then dove into the tent, safe at least from the buzzing horde. Note to selves, don't camp in the outback near a source of open water. Wonder what it will be like up in the Tropics.