Simpson Desert & Home

Chambers Pillar is at the edge of the Simpson Desert and was named by John McDouall Stuart in 1860 after one of his sponsors James Chambers. Stuart led six expeditions through the arid interior of Australia over four years, which resulted in the Australian Overland Telegraph Line being built and the main route from Port Augusta (near Adelaide) to Darwin being established, which is now called the Stuart Highway.

The sandstone pillar towers 50 metres above the surrounding plain and can be seen in the middle of the photograph.

The pattern of parallel sand dunes covered in light green spinifex and the desert oaks in between was just magic! Yet again, there were so many wildflowers!

This flower is called Poached egg daisy (Polycalymma stuartii). Check out the number of petals!

Desert oaks (Allocasuarina decaisneana) apparently grow "pencil-shaped" until the roots find water as seen in the background. Only then do they grow a canopy and look like trees.

Camping at its best: between red sand dunes, under desert oaks and nobody else!

What exactly do they think you would use a chainsaw for? There was not a tree in sight!

Here we are, in the Simpson Desert again! One of our favourite places in Australia! This time we decided to do the crossing on our own. We had plenty of diesel, water and food, we knew what to expect and if we were not in Innamincka before an agreed date, our friends would call Birdsville police. It turned out we were on the Frenchline just after the Birdsville races and during the first two days we had to get out of the way for over 50 cars going in the opposite direction. Lucky we had a sand flag and a UHF radio!

The colour of the sand changes depending on the time of day and the location within the desert. Some dunes are bright orange, some beige, some brown.

The blooming wattles were a nice addition to the colours!

Unfortunately, there were lots of pesky flies and we had to "live" underneath fly nets. We must have consumed a few because they even dive into hot food and liquids.

And of course some more close ups of flora and fauna!

The Simpson Desert has many natural springs and man-made bores, some of them producing thermal water, all of which attract many different bird species.

We saw this Major Mitchell's cockatoo (Lophochroa leadbeateri)  in Finke Gorge National Park. My first one ever! We had to make it grumpy, so it would show its gorgeous feathers!

From Innamincka we decided to make a small detour to see the famous Coongie Lakes, which are protected under the RAMSAR wetland convention. A total of 205 bird species have been recorded in the permanent freshwater lakes, some of them migratory species from Asia. We only saw brolgas and ducks and lots of mozzies!

Once Kirsten drove through this gate into NSW, there was no stopping her and we were home in two days!

Trip Summary:
31,000 kms in 6.5 months

Over 3,000 litres of diesel used

Most expensive diesel: $2.50/litre

Over 6,000 photos taken

Central Desert

From Alice Springs we did two loop drives and then back to Alice to stock up for the Simpson Desert crossing. The first loop was along the West MacDonnell Ranges, then back up to the Tanami Road and into Newhaven Wildlife Sanctuary.

The Ormiston Pound walk is one of our favourite bushwalks and it was just as spectacular as last time! Red, orange and purple rocks with white-barked ghost gums and many wildflowers! Kirsten at our lunch spot on top of the range with a great view into the pound (below with me walking into it).

Ghost gums can grow in the most precarious locations!

Spinifex growing between purple/yellow rocks.

The Finke River has nine permanent waterholes where it gouged its way through the mountain ranges. These sources of freshwater are very important to Aboriginal people, as well as flora and fauna. Below is Redbank Gorge with very little water and....

.... Glen Helen Gorge.

We camped on the Finke River, which is mostly a dry sandy creek bed. Not a bad view first thing in the morning!

Mount Sonder is the last section of the 223km long Larapinta Trail. The walking trail can be seen below leading along the ridge to the summit (1,380m).

The aquatic fern below is Nardoo, which is an important food source for the local Aboriginals. The spore cases are roasted, ground and mixed with water to form a thin paste. If the spores are not roasted (as by Burke and Wills), an enzyme makes Vitamin B1 unavailable to the body. Vitamine B1 is essential for energy metabolism, nerve and brain function and a deficiency causes a fatal disease known as Beri-Beri. Perhaps if Burke and Wills had watched the locals more carefully, they might have survived to become the first white men to cross the continent from south to north. Anybody not familiar with the story of Burke and Wills, should read "The Dig Tree" by Sarah Murgatroyd. Another amazing story of Australian explorers!

Newhaven Wildlife Sanctuary is run by AWC (Australian Wildlife Conservancy) and contains 23 ecosystems, including spinifex sand plains, salt lakes, bloodwoods, dune fields and stands of majestic desert oaks. The salt lake below is covered with odd looking salt tolerant samphire.

Below is Kirsten taking a photograph of Lake Bennett from a sand dune.

Spinifex always seems to make photographs look blurry!

Desert oaks on red sand in the evening light! The photograph does not do it justice! 

Our second loop was along the East MacDonnell Ranges, then north on the Binns Track to Davenport Range National Park and past Devils Marbles Conservation Reserve.

Trephina Gorge National Park is an important habitat for the threatened Black-footed rock wallaby (Petrogale lateralis). 

Bearded dragons seem to like the heat of sealed roads and they are not very fast at moving out of the way!

The Devils Marbles are large boulders that form the exposed top layer of an extensive granite formation. The natural processes of weathering and erosion have created the various shapes of the boulders. They are just amazing!

I had to climb into this one to show the scale. Note the smooth surface where it snapped in two.

This is why a lot of people install a tyre pressure monitoring system in their 4WD! The cause of this blow-out was most-likely an undetected, slow leak in the tread. This created a pressure drop, which lets the tyre flex more and builds up heat in the process.

Our car has a range of approximately 700 kms, which is often not enough in the outback, so we always carried extra.

This is our standard breakfast: oats with nuts, yogurt, milk and fruit....

... and one of our favourite dinners: red vegetable curry.

Spinifex pigeons and Zebra finches were our constant companions in the Central Desert.

We didn't see many reptiles, maybe it was too early in the season. This Long-nosed Dragon (Gowidon longirostris) was one of the few.

For my botanist friends: some more flowers (and bush tomatoes). Some of these desert flowers are so tiny and delicate!