July 13^th

Pink carpet over a clay pan

Rain overnight. Do we travel these roads?? They are all gravel, there are creek crossings, have the rivers and creeks risen? There is no way we can find out as the Murchison Shire Council is not answering the number which John rang on the Satellite phone. Despite listening to the radio for about an hour we did not hear a report on roads.

At about 10.30 am we headed south to the Settlement of Murchison. Evidently the Murchison Shire, which is huge, is the only Shire in Australia which does not have a town. Overall the gravel road was excellent with only a few muddy patches. River and creek crossings were nearly all dry with only one having a steep descent to reach the causeway.

The grey clouded sky contributed to the dull scenery. The same bright mauve/pink ground cover, that we saw yesterday, was very obvious on the flat clay pans amongst the roadside bushes. The brilliant red Rosie Dock added a bright patch to road edges as well. There are some very attractive small Ghost gum Eucalypts dotted through the low bushes.

We had planned to turn off this road and take a minor road across to Cue. Some years ago we visited Walga Rock near Cue and were most impressed with the Aboriginal art work on a large rock gallery. Because of the uncertainty about road conditions we decided against doing this. This is rather disappointing as the drawings are really impressive.

We arrived at Murchison Settlement about 12.30 pm. At the entry to the streets and housing John had to move a ROAD CLOSED sign. Un-be known to us the road we travelled on had been closed. We could see another Road Closure sign ahead of us and on the road to Mullewa. We called at the Shire office to get the ‘truth of the matter’. We will not be going anywhere today!! Maybe we will not be going anywhere for several days. The rain is actually very light but it has been falling now for nearly 24 hours.

Several years ago when we were travelling with Razi and Terry, we spent 24 hours at the same camping ground because of flood waters. Since then, it appears, that all buildings have been renewed. The main Reception and Kiosk has been re-built of ‘rammed earth’ and adjacent buildings have been constructed in a smart new style.