Outback road trip

Ted. One of our objectives during our stay in Adelaide was to venture north to get a small taste of the outback; specifically a taste of a beer in an outback pub. 

The state of South Australia is huge; about the size of Texas and New Mexico combined! The bottom third has a fair amount of moisture and a pleasant Mediterranean type climate. This is also where the vast majority of it’s 1.8 million residents live. However, we wanted to tippy toe into that northern bit that is basically all desert. 

Our target was the old copper mining town of Blinman - population 43. It’s 300 miles due north of us, and the trip took about seven hours. There are no freeways. It’s just two lane blacktop going through every small downtown along the way. As we headed north, we quickly left the suburbs of Adelaide and found ourselves in wheat country. This was where many of the first settlers came, back in the 1840’s. 

Soon we crossed the Goyder’s Line. North of here, the annual precipitation is less than 10 inches so crops should not be grown. This was sheep country and one measures the land, not by how many sheep can live on an acre but how many acres it takes to support one sheep. This is a hard land and most farmers didn’t make it. One man we met had an ancestor who had to sell a 6,000 acre station (ranch) because it was too small to be profitable. Every few miles we’d spot an abandoned farmhouse. 

The towns we met were tiny and typically featured a hotel/pub, a cafe, a general store, a public toilet and, if we were lucky, a gas station. 

Melrose sits at the base of Mt Remarkable

We saw lots of red kangaroos, wallabies, wallaroos and emus. They tend to wander onto the road at dusk, posing a serious hazard to driving. The most common vehicle here is a pickup truck with a heavy grill on the front to protect the fender when local wildlife is eventually struck. 

Wedge tailed eagle pays his respects

Before long, we entered the Flinders Ranges which is a series of low mountain ranges with the highest point being 3,800 feet. They are starkly beautiful and ancient. Rocks here date back 600 million years We finally reached our destination and enjoyed tasty steak pies (they were sold out of the kangaroo and curry pies) washed down with the local brew. Dessert was a tart made from quadongs, a plum like fruit that grows here. 

Our local residence was a cabin at a sheep station. Yes, there were sheep and the restaurant was in the old woolshed. This proved to be a good base for more exploration. But that will be a story for another day…

Sunset at Rawnsley Park Station