Suzanne & Nic Outback Caravan Trip 2025

 July 31st: Awoke to a clear sky and we set off on our Lake Eyre flight, which was actually 5 hours of flying with a stopover at Birdsville for lunch. Seeing Lake Eyre North filled with water was one thing, but travelling over the Channel country where the Diamantina River and Coopers Creek, both in flood break up into a myriad of channels such that there is water from one horizon to the other, was truly spectacular! Coopers Creek has only just reached Lake Eyre. There is only local rain causing a little bit of filling only for south Lake Eyre, but there is no water yet going through the Goyder channel connecting the two halves of the Lake.We ate at the Birdsville Hotel then went to Birddvisitors centre to learn more about the Lake Eyre Basin. On the way back we saw Goyder lagoon which was a huge area of water. We also saw the Birdsville track flooded and it was easy to see way it is closed and will be for some time. We didn’t see as many birds as I thought we might. We saw pelican...

 July 30th: Awoke to sunshine amongst the mud puddles! Breakfasted at the Quandong  cafe, and then hit the road armed with some quandong goodies. We went via Hawker and Lyndhurst and then Parachilna, stopping in for some Bush tomato chilli jam at the Parachilna Hotel. The trees dwindled in number till we were left with a salt bush covered type plain. In front of us across the road ran an emu and not long afterwards an echidna. We then saw a pair of wedge-tailed eagles by the side of the road. We arrived by a dirt road diversion to Marree, where the pub had no room for us to park our van behind it! We were directed to the overflow car park at the caravan park- a muddy gravelly paddock very recently set up to take caravans, presumably because of the demand due to water in lake Eyre. We were told that there would be no other vans there, but actually it was full of vans! The caravan park itself was a bit weird with a few scattered single toilets mainly occupied and locked! We near...

 July 29th: It rained all night and it was still raining when we woke up so we decided to stay in Quorn for another day. We walked down to Scrubby Fella’s for a coffee and a biscuit and had them sitting on either side of their slow combustion stove. We then went on a muddy walk from the back of the caravan park to a garden of Bush foods and Bush medical plants. We particularly took notice of the avenue of quandongs.We then climbed up an embankment and walked along the outside fence of the van park, circumnavigating it as we walked amongst acacias, mulga and bamboo and got even more muddy. I then did the final load of wash for the trip- hard to resist when there was a drier available! Nic cleaned our skylight and attempted to fix its small leak, which has come to light with the rain. It isn’t obvious what the cause of the leak is. I then received a phone call from Arid Air that 2 places on their Lake Eyre flight out of Marree had become available, for July 31st, so we leave for Marr...

 28th July: Got up early to a wonderful sunrise over the beach and a visually spectacular group of photogenic pelicans! Left our wonderful campsite to go on a tour of the Whyalla steel works. The steelworks are huge, but the multiple buildings looked like factories in the time of the dark satanic mills! The steelworks have not really been updated since the time when they were built in the 1960’s. The water for the steel works originally came from the Murray River, but now comes from a bore, recycled storm water and recycled water used in the various steel making processes. Many, many native trees have been individually planted on the factory site, built on reclaimed land. There apparently was even a tree nursery on site to grow up these trees for use on site. There is also a very healthy looking mangrove swamp adjacent to the water supply, with swans  swimming on this body of water. We saw the ovens for processing the steel, the gasworks to produce other gases as a byproduct o...

 July 27th: Woke up early and drove to Cleve. We called in at the Pink Door for a delicious flat white, but no-one knew any details of exactly when the hay trucks were coming. I managed to get my sister to consult the Farmers across borders Facebook page and establish that the trucks were converging upon the Cleve Field Day site, but many of the trucks had already dispersed in different directions out of Wudinna. On our way to finding this site we saw 3 hay trucks approaching Cleve. They were huge! We visited the Goyder memorial then went to the Field to watch 10 trucks unloaded by front end loaders and the hay transferred to smaller trucks. We spoke to Lions club volunteers cooking snags and onions for the driver's, volunteers directing the drivers where to go, to locals from Cleve and to a truck driver who had driven from Norseman with his partner and 2 dogs. Although the surrounding areas now look green after recent rains, it has apparent too late for any hay to grow for the sto...