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Off-piste + living dangerously in the Western Macs
Entry 66 of 85 | show all | print this entry |
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...After a little deliberation that was clearly ever going to reach one conclusion, we turned right out of the Mount Sonder lookout and kissed goodbye to the bitumen. It was rocky red dirt tracks from here on in, 25 km to Redbank Gorge, thundering along at 25 km/hr if we were lucky and caught an uncorrugated section of the road. The underbody of the van wasn't thanking us for this decision, I can tell you. 4x4s roared past every so often, conjuring up giant clouds of dust, smearing the exterior of the van.
An undetermined length of time later, and with the worst stretch of road covered, we pulled out onto the turnoff for Redbank Gorge, and were dismayed to see the road deteriorate further for the 5 km up to the gorge. Covering this short distance took us sometime, aware of the fragility of the van.
Once there it was a 20 minute walk over as many rocks as you'd ever seen in your life, in the blistering midday sun. The destination was perfect, however. The reddest of red rocks and a glorious little waterhole. Having made it this far, it would have been wrong not to go for a dip. That we did, swimming across the creek, doing our granny breaststroke, to this cave across the other side, lit up and flashing under the sun's rays. The water was no less freezing than at Ellery Creek, but in the middle of the day it was so refreshing, and we knew we'd quickly dry off on the walk back... a good thing too, we hadn't brought any towels or anything. This little gorge was completely idyllic, and fully vindicated our decision to head further on up the track.
  
Back on the loop trail, the road flattened out a fair bit, and we reached unprecedented speeds of 60 km/h. Despite this, it seemed like an age, and a vast amount of George Michael songs before we made it to the bend in the road leading south, and then to Tyler's Pass, a lookout over Gosses Bluff and picture perfect rolliing green hills for miles. Gosses Bluff was a complete mystery of this trail, unknown to us beforehand, but just breathtaking when standing before us. It is a 2km wide crater created by a comet impact 140 million years ago, and stands out gloriously in the impossible flatness and wilderness of the outback.
 
 
Thrilled to have seen something a magic as this that we were unaware even existed, we threw on some Christmas songs in celebration, and evidently got carried away. After the turn off towards Hermannsberg (leaving the Kings Canyon turnoff in our wake), the terrain turned rather sandy. Having full tyre pressure, changing gear in the sand proved to be a bit troublesome. When I say a bit, I mean, the van decided to sink into the sand, and refused to come out, for all the pushing and revving in the world. Even after a good half hours digging it still wasn't budging. Nearing sundown and with no other vehicles passing, we resolved to have one more try before resting up for the night. This was a massive digging effort, with Lucy grabbed dead trees of the bush to put under the wheels for traction, and myself burrowing away in a sandpit, leveling the front tyres out. Lucy revved, and I pushed. The van moaned and groaned, and zoomed awake, shrouding me in dust, leaving me with a nice moustache for my efforts. We were overjoyed!
 
Needless to say, the Christmas songs were resumed, but the lethargic driving was not. Pretty soon we were back on the sealed road, and racing the sun to Hermannsberg.
 
This stretch of the road was beset by more issues - this time of the wild horse variety. Out of nowhere, singing along to Merry Christmas Everyone in a jolly fashion, came a pack of wild horses by the side of the road - one hearing the van and obviously having an adverse reaction to it. Instead of running away, it bolted and ran across the road, unnerving us a vast amount! Lucy swerved and managed to avoid it, thank god, but damn, this thing was massive, if we've have hit it it would have run us over, for sure. There were several more packs further up the road, along with cattle and kangeroos, but we were alert from then on, and nothing else crossed our path in the same way.
By sunset we were in Hermannsberg, but didn't consider the place worth stopping, and ploughed on, back to the Alice, where we were nearly out of petrol once more.
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