Day 41 Back into the West MacDonnell Ranges

Today we watched the Ulysses Motorbike Club's procession. It took 35 minutes to pass. We guessed there must have been at least a thousand bikes present. Some riders wore fancy dress and the more we waived, the more they sounded their horns. It was quite a sight to see.

We then headed west again, into the West MacDonnell Ranges to visit Palm Valley near Hermannsberg. On the way we drove in to the Lawrence Gorge. The (extremely) rough access road closely follows John McDouall Stuart's route through the MacDonnell Ranges in 1860-62. The Overland Telegraph Line (1872) followed the Hugh River through Lawrence Gorge. At the entrance to the Gorge, George William Gilbert established a cattle station and built a homestead there, the "Old Owen Springs Homestead". It is the first station homestead built in Central Australia. Only the stonework of this historic building survives.

The 20km road into Palm Springs was 4WD. It was very rough, in and out of the creek beds. We thought we were managing it well until we came to the last 1.6km. That took us over a half an hour to traverse. This was a true 4WD experience, sand, rock hopping, boulder hopping, driving across rock platforms with water on either side. Don't think the Peugeot would have made it! We met up with an experienced 4W driver who helped us over some very tough spots and stayed with us when we were driving out. He and his wife joined us for a walk through Palm Valley/Cicad Gorge (spelling is correct). These are part of the larger Finke Gorge. The Gorge itself is most spectacular with red, heavily weathered cliffs dominating the scene. Then there is a semi-tropical wonderland in the middle of all this, called Palm Valley. It is named after the Central Australian Red Cabbage Palm. This palm is a remnant from the dinosaur days and is accompanied by some very old cycads. There is permanent water in the valley and the combination of palm trees, cycads, ferns, grasses and red rocks was both surprising, being in the middle of the Red Centre, and beautiful. Elated at having seen Palm Valley we were agreeably charged to tackle the 20km return journey to the highway. It was just as rough.

We had a great day in many respects and it culminated in a gorgeous sunset which followed us home.