Day 60

Day 60 Halls Creek

Well today was more adventurous. We got up super early – 7:30, and had a quick breakfast and hit the

Turn off

Wolfe Creek

road to Wolfe Creek Crater (hehehehehehehe – you have to imagine John Jarret in the film Wolf Creek) and the Tanami Desert. We went back to the Alice Spring turn off and drove for 130 kms along the dirt track to get to the crater site. It is technically in the Tanami Desert so we will take that as having done the Tanami Desert. The road at times was very testing but Trude made her way across it. The majority of the track was good, as usual the last quarter was the worst. We drove to the site which was near some

Wolfe Creek Crater

Track down to the crater

cattle yards and as we approached we noticed a cattle truck with 3 trailers loaded with cattle just sitting there with no one around. We drove by and onto the site. On the way back we went past the truck again but the last 2 trailers were there but the front one was gone!

Trude and I waiting

Track to the top

The crater is amazing as far as I can tell from the pictures. Maureen also did a short video as well. The track to the top is all loose rock so I could not get there but Maureen went up and took some great pictures. A meteorite hit the area some 300,000 years ago to form the crater and it was found mid 1900’s by an aerial survey. We were the only ones there yet when we spoke to some travellers who had visited just a few weeks ago, they said it was chockers, just goes to show you how quick the season goes. We packed up and drove back to Halls Creek, along the way we saw farmers doing a stock round up, possibly something to do with our missing truck.

Sign

Information board

On the road was a dead emu, obviously hit by some vehicle either this morning or last night and on it were 3 Wedge Tailed Eagles on road kill clean up duty. One decided to hang around as we drove closer and Maureen was able to get a picture. We returned at lunchtime and had a bite to eat and settled in the airconditioning for a while.

We rested until the heat dropped off a bit and then went for a drive out to Old Halls Creek, some

Maureen on gate duty

Eagle on road kill cleanup duty

15kms out of town on a dirt track. Trude is used to these now and motors along them. We dropped in to Caroline Pool on the way and it is a lovely spot but the water looked a little too stagnant but a good rain and a flush out and it would be a nice stop over. We went on to Old Halls Creek town site and there is this huge shed there that covers the original Post Office that is built out of mud and they have covered it

Caroline Pool

Old Post Office under cover

to preserve it, quite amazing. There are little stone cairns around the place that note places of interest and where original buildings were. It was getting dark by now and I wanted to get back before it was too dark due to the dust on these roads make it hard to see. There was also a big mob of cows near the road that seemed to be most upset when we wanted them to get off the road so we could pass. On the way back in the

Old Post Office

Old Halls Creek Crossing

dark, Maureen wanted to get a picture of a monument in town called Russian Jack, that commemorates all the early settlers who like this guy helped each other out.

We are now looking at going to the Bungle Bungles tomorrow or through to Kununurra but we have not decided yet, I suppose the navigator will tell me sometime on the road but we will definitely be going to Warmun

Road sign near NT border

Russian Jack statue

on the way.

Trude at Caroline Pool

Stock on the road