Thursday, 29 September 2011

Day 11: Arkaroola to Coward Springs

Well we left Arkaroola after only one night. I could have stayed much longer - you could spend weeks exploring that place - in fact I think I liked it better than Flinders Ranges.
We headed west from Arkaroola towards Leigh Creek (dirt road, but much better than yesterday). Drove past the Leigh Creek coal mine - now that's big. It just seemed to go on forever. We then moved on to Maree where we stopped for some biscuits and cheese. Maree is at the south end of the Oodnadatta track and was a significant township on the old Ghan railway, that I assume got it's name from the Afghan cameleers that assisted in transporting goods from the rail line to various stations, etc.

Anyway from there onto Coward Springs, where we met up and camped with our friends we met at Wilpena Pound. Coward Springs is a man made Artesian bore that was was originally sunk when the Ghan railway was constructed. It's quite a little oasis where they have refurbished the ruins of the old train station and homestead and have created a nice little camping ground in the middle of the desert. They've set up a little spa that we all piled into - it's warm and has a surprisingly large amount of spring water flowing through it (was really good for Bridget's eczema)

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