Woonona Mob "Zig Zag Oz": October 2013

All roads lead to Alice but which one do we leave on? This dilemma took us a few days deliberation. Russ asked the locals, who gave us their opinion, but suggested we ask the local constabulary. We did and they gave Russ the phone number for “travelling safe” which was actually the Child Protection Service hotline…???? Oh well. We decided the Old Ghan track could be interesting, Old South Road it was, as they had recently graded it for the “Finke Desert Challenge”, a rally car race through the desert. We stopped in at Titjikala community for lunch and to view their art gallery. Whilst in Alice we had visited the art gallery for their Desert Mob exhibition and had seen some amazing work, so were keen to see it first hand. We were lucky enough to meet many of the artists who were there for a meeting. The road from here was excellent, as long as you watched out for the old spikes on the road, huge rusted nails off the Old Ghan (It was my turn to drive during this interesting segment!). We followed this through to Mt Dare and then on to Dalhousie Springs. The road from Mt Dare deteriorated, with a 35km drive taking us 3 hours! The corrugations rough enough to shake your teeth loose! We stayed at Dalhousie Springs for a couple of nights. The springs are on the edge of the Simpson Desert. They are the size of about 3 olympic pools and sit at a constant temperature of 34-38 degrees. We loved having our baths each day, but looked forward to getting out and letting the breeze cool us down, as the water was the same temperature as outside. It was from here that the flies became increasingly horrendous, and just as they left for the night, the mozzies descended. Luckily we had stocked up on fly nets and iser in Alice. We were going through buckets of moisturiser and lip balm. We discovered that flies don’t like blue fly nets but were oblivious to black ones. So our advice….if you are in the market for a fly net is …buy blue! We drove out a little to the edge of the Simpson. We spoke to some guys heading out for the Simpson Desert Bike Challenge, a 10 day bike race through the Simpson. They use specialist “fat” bikes designed for riding over snow, like mountain bikes but with thicker tyres. Dalhousie appears to be a bit of a staging post for people either setting out or returning from their Simpson Desert adventure. From Dalhousie we headed down the Oodnadatta track, via Coward Springs and Lake Eyre. Dalhousie to the Oodnadatta track was again very rough going, but the Oodnadatta was recently graded and more like a high way than a track. From here we head to the Gammon Ranges.