Day 14, Friday 25 June 21
Broke camp, refuelled at a boggling 208 cents a litre for Diesel. Headed off around the Mereenie Loop Road towards Hermannsburg. Would have to be one of the worst maintained roads in Australia – and you get to pay for the privilege of using it🤔!
Enroute we caught glimpses of Tnorala Bluff (caused by a big meteorite a long time ago), the Western MacDonnell Range and several horses and mules.
3 hours of bad corrugations , and a windscreen star later from a rock thrown up by someone driving too fast for the conditions , we pulled into Hermannsburg for a quick bite and a stretch.
Hermannsburg sits on Arrente Land. One of its most famous people is Albert Namitjara , renown for his impressive water colour landscapes of the region. We acknowledge the Arrente’s traditional custodianship of these lands and pay our respects to their elders past, present and emerging.
A quick check of the road conditions with SGT Rosie at the Hermannsburg cop shop , then onto the Palm Valley Road towards the Finke River National Park. The road follows the normally dry bed of the Finke River, whose claim to fame in geological and riverine system fame is being ‘the oldest river in the world’.
The Finke is unlike most other rivers – it rises in desert mountains ( the Western MacDonnells) and then essentially disappears and dissipates into the Simpson Desert several hundred kilometres to the South East. It never meets the sea, nor does it contribute to any other river system. The closest similar thing is perhaps the Okavango Delta in Botswana. But with vastly less reliable and regular flow – the river can go years without any serious water / flood.
We set up camp and headed out for a walk up the Kalarranga Lookout. Not only a nice stretch out after the day’s corrugations, the views in the late afternoon light were stunning.
Back to camp to knock up a Thai Green curry, we ate as the even fuller moon rose in the East and the horizon to the West glowered purple and red with the setting sun.
Ness’ and Mark’s Wandering 