Day 15: Marree (LAKE EYRE!!!!)

THE MOST EPIC DAY OF THE JOURNEY.
This page will invovle quite a few photos. Carefully selected from about 300 I might add!

We drove up from the Flinders into the desert region of SA. It was absolutely SCARCE!!! but amazing being out in such a vast expanse of nothingness.
On our way up to Marree we stopped infamous pub 'The Prairie'. In the town (I use that term lightly) of Parachilna, The Prairie has been an institution for the last half a century. Primarily as a travellers stop, and secondly as a foodie extravaganza.
What we ate:
1) Feral Food Antipasto.
This involved smoked kangaroo, camel salami, emu pate, fresh goats cheese and other antipasto delights.
2) The Feral Mixed Grill.
This included emu fillet mignon wrapped in bacon, kangaroo schnitzel and camel sausage.
Everything was actually insanely delicious!!

On our way to Marree on the edge of Lake Eyre we had to drive for about 80kms of dirt road (sorry mum). On this journey we had to cross the 'flooding' which was luckily only a few cm's deep!

The second part of the day centred on our flight over Lake Eyre. We were flown in a light prop plane by a guy named Andrew. The only other person to come with us was a German guy who was doing some professional filming, so we luckily managed to have the plane door open for pretty much all of our 2 1/2 hour flight. Andrew also did numerous ducks and dives to make sure we were flying with flocks of pelicans or could see certain aspects of the landscape. All at only 500ft!

Firstly, Lake Eyre is HUGE!!!!!!!
It is the second largest Salt Lake in the world and is 8 times saltier than the ocean and twice as dense as the Red Sea!
The most striking thing about the Lake and the surrounding floodlands was all the different colours of the water.
Some areas were pink due to an algae that grows in salt water lakes. Some was deep red due to sand that has blown down from the simpson desert. Some was white from the salt pans. And some was blue like a Carribean sea.
In contrast to all of this water there were parts of the earth with deep cracks and rivets from the years of drought that this area has gotten used to.

Flood plains

Red sand from the Simpson Desert in Lake Eyre

Salt pans on the edge of lake Eyre - when the lake is empty the salt is as hard as concrete!

Cracked drought-y earth

Desert sunset

After flying over the lake , Bel and I watched a spectacular desert sunset and then cuddled up in our little cabin and watched Summer Heights High. The population of about 40 in Marree didn't seem to have much of a Wednesday night nightlife going on...

Word of the day: Fettle (to remove sand from) - "A fettling gang removing sand from the train tracks".