Cracking stories from our Group Trips - Part 5 - stories from trips to the SA deserts:

Cracking stories from our Group Trips, is a series of journals about our time leading group trips all over Australia.

"You couldn't make this stuff up!"

It's a place where adventure and discovery are constant companions.

All these stories have become folklore in our groups and get regularly trotted out over campfires some of which tend to get a tad embellished over time. The richest memories are often about relationships and the group dynamics rather than the destination.

The stories are not so much about an event but rather a time, an attitude, a way of life.

Why tell stories?:

Story telling is an essential human need that has been used, for ever, for entertainment, education and cultural preservation. Compelling story telling is the path to imagination and people are hungry for stories.

Memorable travel turns you into a story teller.

Story # 1 - 'we were discussing our very survival' - Operation Dig Tree:

"Surrounded by water, and with the most rain in living memory, we were discussing our very survival".

Do we we evacuate, with a 472km drive, to civilisation and risk getting stranded on a remote impassable desert track or do we stay and risk the whole town going under water? An agonising two choice dilemma.

We had moved camp once already and another 12cm of water would put the town under water. It was April 1990 and there were 100 people stranded at the Innamincka Trading Post including a party of school students. Despite having an average annual rainfall of only12.5cm, this rain event had filled Lake Eyre being only the third time last century. In the previous year, the Trading Post was cut off for three months.

Innamincka is in the 1.3 million hectare Heritage listed Innamincka Regional Reserve with a population of 6 and two buildings.

The only thing rivalling the water depth was the remains of a black insect plague, 15cm deep in places, from three weeks earlier and just before the insects the town endured a plague of sandflies. The insects provided a feast for birds and dingoes who were deprived of their natural food source.

Insects however, are not enough for the wild dingoes who made some raiding parties on the pub store. The Trading Post owner, Mike Steele, said the dingoes tore a hole in the external wall of the store, broke through an internal partition and pilfered 15kg of dog food.

A half starved dingo who had been adopted by the town was christened 'Wingnut' because of his thin body and big ears. His teeth fell out from malnutrition and he went after everything soft to eat. After one incident of pilfering from the pub stores, Wingnut devoured 80 packets of gum and a packet of cigarettes in one binge.

It got to the point where we could not take it any more despite having moved to one of the few cabins at the Trading Post. We had been there for three days watching the water rise. Each morning, Stephen (then age 7) would finish breakfast and say "I'm going to the pub to play pool Mum". The Trading Post included the pub. The sign on the pub said "You are in Innamincka" The rest of the world is Outamincka.

We explored all the options, over several days, with the other stranded travellers and eventually decide to run the gauntlet. We would be a convoy of eight vehicles on the 472km trip to Lyndhurst on the iconic Strzelecki Track despite the threat of a fine for driving on a closed road. The fine for driving on a closed road was $1K per wheel at the time and we had six wheels including our camper trailer.

The Strzelecki Track was so wet and sticky we could not get out of second gear for the first 440km using fuel at a rate of 31 litres/100km. At one point, I saw what I thought was a camper trailer overtaking us but realised it was our camper trailer as we travelled sideways for much of the trip.

One family in our convoy broke the draw bar clean off their camper trailer when crossing one of the many sand dunes. Fortunately, a cattle station 15km away was able to weld the draw bar back on. The photo above shows our overnight camp, at the turn off to Mount Hopeless, in the middle of the remote Strzelecki Desert.

We did meet the Highways Dept. near the other end yet they could see we had no choice but to evacuate as the whole town did eventually go under water. Thankfully, no fines were issued.

The whole evacuation took 13 hours (excluding the breakdown) with the worst stretch taking 9 hours to cover 253km. With huge relief, we made it to Lyndhurst with 20 litres of fuel to spare.

The photo above shows our convoy at a standstill when one family broke the draw bar on their camper trailer. The other photo shows the celebratory moment when we arrived at Lyndhurst.

Despite this dramatic event, or perhaps because of it, this was an outstanding touring adventure being a circuit from Broken Hill to, Tibooburra, Cameron's Corner, Innamincka, Flinders Ranges, Burra, Clare and back to Broken Hill. The expedition followed some really beautiful and remote country.

The Strzelecki Track is currently undertaking a sealing project which will make travel easier yet it will lose some of the mystique of this iconic adventure. The main road from Broken Hill To Tibooburra is now sealed.

We are due for another visit soon and will provide a dedicated post to this amazing destination.

Story # 2 - Improvise, Adapt, Overcome - "camaraderie at its best" - Operation Desert Sky:

"The back diff was floating, steering was gone and Wayne knew he was in trouble".

Disaster struck on the remote Oodnadatta Track on Operation Desert Sky, to the Simpson Desert in 2015. The bolt holding Wayne's sway bar to the chassis had fallen out. The sway bar holds the rear diff in place so Wayne's back wheels were floating all over the place.

The theme of the trip was "Improvise, Adapt, Overcome" so, true to this mantra, there was great camaraderie to get this problem solved. Given a bolt like this was an unlikely spare part, we jacked the sway bar back into place and fitted a tent peg through the bolt hole. To Waynes great relief, this worked and held things together until Wayne got to the Pink Roadhouse at Oodnadatta where he could get a replacement high tensile bolt fitted.

At one point we came upon an old wreck and I attempted to removed a bolt, of the right length, to use on Waynes car yet it was just a tad too large so Wayne was stuck with the tent peg.

Wayne found this such a great story he still has the tent peg mounted on his trip memorabilia in his shed.

David & Rosemary Allan – the faces behind:

May adventure & discovery be your constant companions.

Reflection:

For me, a trip is memorable when I am enriched by a deeper sense of connection to a place which triggers an emotional or spiritual response. This comes from feelings of Awe when I feel part of something bigger. Such as, seeing dramatic landscapes, being caught up in the history and sensing the passion of the human spirit.

A memorable experience will cause me to day dream about the next trip even more than the last trip.

Remember: Your adventure begins the moment you decide to go.