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.

   We started day 8 of our trip with an early morning dip in the hot spring.

The unique bark of the red mulga not far from the springs at the o'clock creek camp ground.

Opossum Waterhole. Also not far from Dalhousie.

A welcome swallow.

 After Dalhousie Springs we headed out towards Mt Dare stopping first to have a look at Federal ruins.

The ruins were mainly the remains of stockyards.Here we found the prints of a dingo.

 Once we got to Mt Dare, we filled the cars and went in for a drink. It's one of those outback pubs with character having stubby holders hanging from the rafters. For a $10 donation to the Flying Doctors you too can hang up your stubby holder. There were also alot of stickers on the petrol pump.

On the side of the bar was marked the flood level for 2011. And Old Andado was our ultimate destination for the night via Binns track. We still had a long way to go.

First we took a wrong turn and went onto a very dusty track on Aboriginal land.

And then we had to cross over into the Northern Territory.

 The drive along here is on the fringe of the Simpson Desert and there were a number of red sand dunes.

Lunch was near a very dry bore and it was here that we lost the bash plate for our gas tank. The corrugations were so bad that the clips holding the plate on came loose and broke. 

Don't forget to shut the gate...... or just go around it.

And it's left towards Old Andado. Alice Springs is still a couple of days away.

The view from the sand dune was well worth the stop.

 Finally we arrived at the Old Andado Station, once home to Molly Clarke, a true pioneer of the Australian outback.

" Molly Clark arrived in the Territory in the 1950s to take over running Old Andado Station, about 330 kilometres south-east of Alice Springs.

She later became involved in tourism and founded the National Pioneers Women's Hall of Fame in 1993, one of only three museums in Australia dedicated to the role of women in history.

Current President of the National Pioneer Women's Hall of Fame, Lynne Peterkin, says it was a visit to a stockmen's museum in Longreach that inspired Molly to open her own. (http://www.abc.net.au/)"

 Molly passed away in 2012. Her final years were spent in Alice Springs but she has been buried at the Station.For a small fee, it is a nice place to camp for the night. Various caretakers stay throughout the year to look after the place. The current caretaker ,"Cobbie" was a true outback character, a bush poet and one time drover, he had plenty of stories to tell us.

                                        Molly's house has been well preserved, just as she left it.

The place is home to a large number of finches.

The meat house was where the meat was prepared and stored. It was salted to preserve it then hung to dry until needed. No refrigeration back then.
There are two such buildings, the other being a storeroom for saddlery and other equipment.

 As the sun set the colours of the sand dunes changed to a deep red. It was a lovely evening around the campfire listening to Cobby's poems and tales, a fascinating man. Unfortunately, this is where I tripped and hurt my knee. Because of this I was unable to do alot of long walks later in the trip.

Cobby was a very animated story teller which is why he is out of focus.