Fri 20th June – Day 41: Boulia towards Lark Quarry

After staying up quite late last night to upload the blog we all slept in, but still managed to be at school by 8:45. 2 hours later the owner of the caravan park was back hassling us about the 10am leave time (in the entire 6 weeks we have travelled so far no-one has batted an eye at our regime of doing ‘school’ each morning and leaving a little later when the flies come out, not sure what her problem was but it was anything but welcoming!
We decided to visit the ‘Min Min Encounter and Info Centre, being the best place to learn about the unexplained phenomenon of the mysterious ‘Min Min Lights’, which are still seen in the area today. Set around the 1800’s when the old Min Min hotel was still standing, it tells the yarns, legends and more scientific explanatinons given to the strange lights that seem to follow people in the middle of no-where. Chloe was suitably scared and looks forward to this evenings roadside camp with severe trepidation!
Next the Stonehouse Museum where we met ‘Dick Suter’, a wealth of knowledge about the early settlers and how they survived the summer heat. There is a large collection of old machinery, hospital equipment, saddlery, and fossils especially dinosaur bones. ‘Dinosaur Dick’ as we nick named him was a former fish pirate (overfilling his quota for legal catch sizes around Sydney waters), cattle rustler and now resident dinosaur expert – I learnt more about dinosaur fossils than ever before and if we could have stayed, I’m sure he would have talked on through the night. Toby at the end of it all still wants to be a palaeontologist and with Chloe faint from hunger, we dragged ourselves away from his stories to head further eastwards into channel country. Passing 3 young emus’ on the medium strip outside the local pub we begin our journey towards the ‘dinosaur trail’.
Once in the car fortified by food, Toby piped up “Look Chloe it’s 3:25 in the afternoon” which means ‘game-boy’ is now permissible for the weekend and he has timed it so as not to waste a single minute! He has ploughed his way through the 6 new ‘Beast Quest’ books this past 5 days so I guess we can’t complain.
The presence of a 3G connection last night gave me false hope that we would be in somewhat populized country from now on, and although we are having to move off the 1 lane bitumen quite often to let the road trains pass, no-one has passed us all afternoon. There is nothing but red dirt and the odd fence for miles around. In the distance flat top mesa’s rise like mirages from the flat landscape and it is easy to see why this was all once an inland sea.
Definitely animal country now as we pass small flocks of Emu, pigs & many red kangaroo. Apparently Emu did once fly as their hollow honeycomb leg bones lay testament, and the remnants of their wings still have a small digit on the ends.
We chose a creek bed to pull up in tonight as the wind was howling across the plains and the stand of Mulga should afford us some protection. We needn’t have worried though, as soon as the sun dipped below the horizon the wind died and all was very peaceful. The moon was late rising so we had darkness all around to eat our pasta by the firelight and think about the ‘Min Min’.
Old Cork Road Bushcamp (about 30km from Old Cork)