Friday 30/7/2010 Birdsville to Cooper Creek at Windorah

(Birdsville to Cooper Creek at Windorah)
Overcast and drizzly. Breakfast in the Birdsville Hotel.
First we checked out flight prices. $660pp to Lake Eyre. Bugger. Too much for four of us, plus the cloud cover is probably too thick to see a lot anyway.
Ran in to Brians crew again this morning. They didn't get to Birdsville last night. His mate got bogged at Eyre Creek which held them up too long and they had to make camp out there.
Checked out where the town gets it's 95 degree C bore water from 1200m down. This supplies Birdsville with electricity, hot water and (cooled) cold water. Wow, great natural resources!
Diamantina River is very full of very brown, muddy water, with thick, gooey, grey clay along the banks. On the south bank we visited a Burke and Wills tree, reading the historical information as our lesson today.
Left at 0910hrs.
I took a photo of the famous Birdsville Racetrack under water.

Heading east on a gravel road, with sections of tar occasionally to cut through the ridge of sand dunes, which are very sparse but still present.
Driving along the northern edge of the Sturt Stoney Desert it is treeless except where a creek bed cuts through.

Jordan and Jack are both engrossed in a James Rollins book each.
It's 1130hrs and we've just passed Cordillo Downs Road which is closed. It is raining. Today we have already driven as far as yesterdays entire trip. (Much quicker off sand).

We just ran into our Birdsville Hotel neighbours at our lunch stop. Fellow 4WD travellers all become best friends out here!
The road south through Arrabury is also closed, so we can't go anywhere near Innamincka at all. We have no choice but to continue east, to camp on the Cooper Creek at Windorah.
There is actually still the occasional red sand dune but over 20km apart.
When almost at Windorah there were sand ridges, spinifex and kites. It felt like a mixture of the Gibson and Simpson deserts. Drove past a flock of about 15 kites, then through a locust swarm which sounded like hail hitting the windscreen.
The town of Windorah is green!
It is the catchment area forr the Cooper Creek, the cause of the floods at Innamincka.
So instead of camping on the Cooper Creek at Innamincka we are camping on the Cooper Creek at Windorah. It is beautiful.

Windorah is a tiny town. We had stopped at the information centre that also doubles as a very small museum. There was a huge photo on the wall showing this part of the Cooper flooded, with all of the multiple branches joined up to form a 1km wide river.
It's not quite that flooded here, and receding. We are camped between those branches. There are a few other campers well scattered along the banks.
We set up camp in light rain at 1600hrs, right on the river bank (but it was 5m above water level).
As soon as the rain stopped we explored a bit, collected wood and made a lovely fire. The kids are keen for a card night.
It is very humid and warm enough for T-shirts at 1830hrs. Whenever we walk we get 3 inches of clay under each boot.

A lovely evening. Dinner, damper with m&ms made by Jordan, then cards by the fire.