Day 2 Flinders Ranges/Wipena Pound

Knowing that we'd be staying in the same place again this evening, we left all unessential items, took lots of water/sunscreen/hats etc and headed off for a long day of walking and sight-seeing.

First was a stop at an old sheep-station, which is now pretty run down. Interesting to see the buildings and find out about how settlers a couple of hundred years ago lived.

Next we did some walking in the Flinders Ranges National Park. Again, beautiful scenery and we even spotted the odd Kangaroo bounding through the undergrowth. It was only slightly spoiled by the constant fly attacks, and Danni resorted to buying a very tasteful fly net head piece (see the photo). We also got to see some amazing Aboriginal Rock Art on some caves here. Although they've been there a few thousand years, they are pretty clear and it was fascinating to find out about what they mean and the symbolism surrounding them.

Then we drove on to Wilpena Pound, which is basically a forested area but in the shape of an enormous bowl. We set out on a walk to one of the look-outs half way up one of the 'sides' of the pound, after being told by our reliable tour guide Jen that it would be a short stroll there and back… Around 4 hours later, after climbing up some steep tracks and having reached the lookout, we returned back to the bus. A few of the group were a bit annoyed by the length of the walk, and the lack of food to sustain us, but Team Salty-Lamb (D, N, Z) took the 'you're only going to do it once' attitude and generally enjoyed it.

Finally, we did a quick walk through Parachilna Gorge to try and spot some very rare Yellow-Footed Rock Wallabies. They were pretty hard to spot but Zoe reinforced her reputation as the best nature spotter in the group and we found ourselves being watched over by Wallabies sitting on rock shelves way above our heads in the Gorge. We also saw several Kangaroos, but they were chased off by our Japanese friend who seemed intent on getting as close as possible to film them.

The evening was spent eating Emu, Kangaroo and other strange meat and drinking a few beers in the local pub. Perfect.