Oz Trip - Day 19 - Coward Springs

Day 19 – 20/5/2012 – Coward Springs

We left Muloorina Station re fuelled in Maree again and headed towards Coward Springs. Lots more dirt, corrugations and flies!!

I think living in the desert must send people a bit loopy, or they just have way too much spare time on their hands. Here are some of the strange things that we saw at a place called “Plane Henge”.

Plane Henge

The Robot and Sunflower

The Ghan Hover Bus

We stopped off at a lookout at Curdimurka that over looks Lake Eyre South. Lake Eyre South is 12m below sea level. There was still water in it. We had a walk down onto the waters edge. It was amazing to see how much bird life was here. It was a bit strange hearing seagulls squawking in the desert! It is good to say that we have now flown over Lake Eyre with water in it, walked on it and touched water in it.

A big inland sea

Seagulls

We had lunch at Curdimurka, one of the old railway sidings of the original Ghan railway. It was still in pretty good condition.

Curdimurka Siding

Just south of Coward Springs we stopped off at “The Bubbler” a natural spring in the middle of nowhere. Apparently due to man made influences the spring is nowhere near as active as it use to be. It use to shoot water about 0.5m into the air. But due to more bores being placed and the Artesian Basin being used a lot more, it has been reduced to merely a trickle.

The Bubbler

The landscape around The Bubbler

After we setup camp at Coward Springs we decided to have a swim in the spring. The water was a refreshing 27deg. No where near as hot as the Lightening Ridge spring, and no were near as big either. Any more than two people and it would have been pretty cosy!

The Coward Springs Camp Ground Entrance

Our Camp

The Spring

We went for showers after a swim in the spring to rinse off the sand and also warm up a bit. Unfortunately we didn't check the showers out until we were heading over to them. We found out if you wanted hot water you had to light a small fire under the donkey boiler and wait for about half an hour for it to heat the water up. We couldn't be bothered waiting that long and it was getting dark so we had cold showers that night.

The donkey boiler and shower block

There was an old railway building that was an engine drivers cabin. It is slowly being restored. It provided a perfect backdrop for some more photography shots.

Engine drivers cabin

Sunset

The hut was about 300m from our camp site. It was a little bit spooky and nerve racking walking away from camp into the bush and not being able to see the camp lights.  There was no moon out and was pitch black.  We had already experienced how easy it was to get totally disorientated at night time in the bush at Wilpena so I was particularly careful to know where the camp site was all of the time. I had had enough when it started to get a bit cooler and the dingos started howling. They were sending more shivers up my spine than the cool wind.

The Hut and the Milky Way

If you look close enough you can see an owl sitting on the roof of the hut in the middle of the peak.