Lake Eyre and more

To Lake Eyre | Over the lake | Around Wilpena Pound | North Flinders and return | Movies
Part 2: Flying over Lake Eyre
This was the fun part: Ian decided that keeping low most of the time was more interesting (check the elevations recorded in the big pictures!). We saw a good deal, and Ian told us all about the place (he's a fifth-generation pastoralist, and owns much of what we flew over). The flight took around four and a half hours in all, including a refuelling stop, and we covered a lot of ground. We took quite a few movies, too: you can see them at the end of the pictures.

[click for larger images/more detail, including latitude, longitude, elevation]

Mustering a few cattle (that's why we flew so low: sort of)	Red dirt, green vegetation: the outback has never looked so alive!	The Ediacara Range	Lake Eyre! (as far as the eyes can see)
Our Cessna 172 was a little worn	Lake Eyre's Junction Gully off Jackboot Bay (looking north-east)	The tip of Hunt Peninsula, in the Elliot Price Conservation Park	Inspecting the shoreline for 'emergency landings' (we had to get low for a reason...)
Although the altimeter read '0', we were just above the ground at the time (and below sea level)	The water in the lake had a real pink hue	Still 'looking for emergency landing strips'!	The white dot in the middle (left) is the remains of a Cessna that flew too close to the water
We dropped into Muloorina Homestead to refuel and stretch legs	Looking down the Frome River towards Marree	Magnificent scenery!	A close-up as we flew past
Looking back along the old Ghan Railway to junction of Oodnadatta and Birdsville tracks (at Marree)	More of the old Ghan (now relocated to the west)	Illusion Plains: many commercials are filmed here	Close-up of the strange geography
The Witchelina Hills	Lake Eyre South in the distance	The Ochre Cliffs, used by aboriginals for thousands of years (they traded ochre)	Lyndhurst, junction of Strzelecki Track and track to Marree
The only segment of sealed road on the Strzelecki Track, near Lyndhurst	The 'old' Leigh Creek coal mine	Another view of the old mine	A small part of the new mine: the yellow dots are huge mining trucks
The white area is marked for further mining (Leigh Creek)	It's really, really BIG!	Where they store Leigh Creek's water	And the Leigh Creek mining village, with trees!
We had to fly for a while with the windows open	Gammon Range in the far north	Ubiquitous 4WD and trailer, and roadside ruin	Back at hotel (not sure about the reindeer)