The
morning sun brought no relief from the biting bugs, so we covered up
and quickly ate our oatmeal and coffee and got back out on the road.
The Oodnadatta Track is for the most part fairly well groomed,
comparable to the gravel Pleasant Valley Road between our house and
Bennett's. Driven at around 50 mph it's dusty but not bad, although
the washboard does produce a loud hum that makes conversation
difficult. We met cars coming from the opposite direction every 10
to 20 minutes, and it's a good idea to slow down and move to the left
to reduce the possibility of thrown gravel hitting your windshield.
But slowing down for that reason, or to stop and take a photo, means
your car loses the hydroplaning effect and begins to feel every jolt
through the wheels, shocks and springs. The LC can take it, but it's
occupants, animal, vegetable and mineral, are shaken about with some
force until you come to a complete stop or get back up to speed.
Unfortunately,
besides corrugations there are spots where you come upon larger rocks
embedded in the road for many meters, sometimes hundreds. It's a bad
idea to go 50 mph over those. Again, the LC can probably take it, but
there's a reason many traveler's carry multiple spare tires in the
outback. When the air temperature is over a hundred and the rubber
in the tires has been flexing in and out for hours, the tires will
get very hot and can blow out on impact with the wrong sharp rock.
So it's slow down, bump along, then, when you get to a better section,
back up to speed.
At one
set of train ruins a small catchment pond behind an earthen dam was
surrounded by trees. There were thousands of birds flying in and out
of the trees, landing on the shore for a drink, and chattering in the
trees. Looking from the top of the dam we could see Pink breasted
Galahs and pure white Corellas filling the branches of the gum trees.
Behind us the barren desert stretched to the horizon.
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| Little Corellas in gum trees |
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| Galahs lined up on branch to get a drink |
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| The other side of the dam |
The dam
provided a water source for the steam locomotives that ran on the old
Ghan RR. We explored the ruins, then continued on.
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| Demineralization tower and water tank |
I'm a
sucker for old cars and ruined buildings, as you're probably
beginning to figure out. We rattled to stop for a photo opportunity
and a ute pulled up behind us and pulled over. Rubberneckers expecting
to find something more interesting than an old rust heap and a pile
of stones, I bet. I heard a 'wuff' from the back of the ute and slyly
walked down the road to see what it was, acting as if I was only
trying to get a better angle for my photo. Tied on a short leash in
the back of the ute was a fierce looking dog who glared at me when he
saw me. I quickly stole a photo, not taking the time to set
up a proper shot. The old adage that dogs and their owners often
look like each other held true in this case, and I was unwilling to
test another old saying of judging books by their covers.
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| We stopped to get a photo of this... |
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| ... but found this dog more interesting Any dog that could stand the heat and dust and shaking probably shouldn't be messed with |
At the
William Creek roadhouse we turned left, leaving the Oodnadatta track,
and took the 160 km road to Coober Pedy. There is almost nothing
along that stretch. In the three hours it took us to drive the
distance we passed two cars, four horses, and one truck;
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| 160 km of nothing... |
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| ...except ol' Mack |
We
reached the outskirts of Coober Pedy around four o'clock. CP is one
of the most unusual towns in the world. Opal was discovered there in
the 1960's and the landscape was transformed. But more about that in
the next posting. We found the library, used up our free allotment
of data by emailing and posting, drove out to Riba's Underground
Campground, and heated up our leftover beans and rice and visited
with three French and two German kids working and traveling around Oz
for the year. We slept in a chamber carved out of the sandstone in
the side of the hill, away from the flies, and only dimly aware of
the wind howling outside all night long.
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| Entrance to Riba's Underground Campground |
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| The light comes from a bore hole to allow for air circulation Sleep tight |
That underground camping looks sweet!
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