The start of our second week away and it was another beautiful morning . Cobby took us for a drive to visit a shack, a gunyah he called it,built for a couple of scientists in 1994.

                                Potato bush. (?)     

                   Mulla Mulla flowers.


A quick visit to Molly's grave and a last look at her house before saying farewell to Cobby. We were off to the Lambert Centre which is the gravitational centre of Australia.

We had to turn off at Finke(Aputula) to get to the centre. Finke is home to the Finke Desert Race held yearly in June. It goes from Finke to Alice Springs and is held over two days.

It was a narrow sandy track to the centre but an easy drive
to the centre.

"In 1988 the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia determined, as a Bicentennial project, the geographical centre of Australia. A monument was erected to mark the location and named in honour of Dr. Bruce P Lambert, a former Director of the Division of National Mapping, for his achievements in the national survey, leveling and mapping of the continent. Similar to the centre of gravity method, the location was calculated from 24 500 points at the high water mark of Australia's coastline.

In the 1930s when Dr C.T. Madigan travelled through Central Australia he calculated the centre of gravity by using a metal cut-out of Australia with a plumb bob and string. His crude measurement was surprisingly accurate as he selected a point less than 11 kilometres due west of this present position."( www.ga.gov.au/scientific-topics/.../centre-of-australia-states-territories)

Australia's centre. 

There are pit toilets here but they are pretty disgusting.

After a look around and the obligatory photos, we headed back towards Finke where we turned onto the Old Ghan Heritage Trail towards Chambers Pillar where we planned to stay the night.
The track runs on top of the old railway and still has many spikes lying around. You need to keep an eye out for them to prevent tyre damage.
Unfortunately for two of our fellow travellers , undamaged tyres were not to be.
The trail also runs parallel to the Finke Desert Race track.

The track also runs along the outer edges of the Simpson Desert.

                    It was very hot and dry and not a pleasant time at all whilst repairs were underway.
Finally we made it to the turnoff to Chambers Pillar and Maryvale Homestead where we stopped for much needed icecream and cold drinks.We also were able to put fuel in the cars .

An Australian ring-necked parrot.

At the top of the Charlotte Range we got our first sight of Chambers Pillar in the distance.

Window Rock and Castle Rock are two formations near the Pillar.

A lovely campsite awaited us with a great view of Chambers Pillar and a decent pit toilet nearby. So after setting up camp we went for a walk, though for me it was just a short walk to get a decent view of the sunset. The pillar is made of sandstone and rises 50 metres above the plain. Stuart first saw it in 1860.

 The evening light turned the grass heads to silver and gold. It was a lovely sunset.