Day 14 - Arkaroola, SA to Blinman, SA

We packed up camp and headed to the Arkaroola reception so we could be an access pass for the Echo Camp Backtrack 4wd track. 

Interestingly, in the reception area they had some photos of the owners of Arkaroola ancestors.  Looking at the photos we realized that we shared the same ancestors! Captain John Germein and his wife Alice were the great grandparents of the owners of Arkaroola and we are descendants from the Germeins as well. It was pretty cool to have a connection to the place like that, even though it is only a distant connection.

After that little discovery, we went and purchased the passes for the Echo Camp Backtrack 4wd track.  This track is classified as Extreme 4x4 for advance 4x4 drivers.  It is a 45km loop which starts and finishes at Arkaroola Reception.  The track travels through ranges, up hills and down through gullies.  There are quite a few points of interests along the way such as waterholes and gorges. 

The scenary was absolutely stunning!  Beautiful hills covered in greenery that towered over us.

We stopped at some waterholes to have a look and snacked on teddy bear biscuits, yum!

We had lunch a dried up waterhole.  That was a bit of a messy stop. We had cup of soups for lunch, Dad managed to drop his soup all down his leg and I managed to get a massive bruise on my leg from James's car.  I was getting something out of his car and shut door without moving my leg out the way, digging the corner of the door into my thigh.  Gosh it hurt so much!
The dried up waterhole was pretty cool.  There were trees growing out of the rocks on the side of the cliffs!  The rock looks like a face on the left side of the tree in this photo :-).

Some areas of the track were quite steep, however I probably wouldn't have classified it as extreme 4x4ing.  The track was more like medium difficulty.
There were some gorgeous views along the way which we stopped to take photos of.

We saw a lot of wallabies in Arkaroola.  Arkaroola has a very good habitat for yellow-footed rock wallabies.  Unfortunately I didn't get to see any of those.   But we did find some Sturt Desert Pea, the flower of South Australia.  There were quite a few patches of them around Arkaroola.

We arrived back at the Arkaroola reception and decided to have snack before heading off to Blinman.  Chips and gravy it was!  When they brought it out though, it was more like gravy soup with a few chips floating in it,not that appetizing :-/
The drive to Blinman was quite beautiful.  The scenery was spectacular, it had a bit of a Jurassic Park quality to it.

We finally arrived in Blinman which is a lovely quaint little town.  We went to the local pub to have a drink and pick up the keys to the place we were staying in (an old ex-police station). 

The police house was absolutely freezing, much colder than the tent the night before.  We are staying in Blinman for one more day, planning to do some exploring tomorrow :-)