Alan & Lyn's Huge Adventure: 17/5/21 Inland toward Cue

Leaving the coast we head east , Climbing all the way . The cyclone hit here as well , many tree's & branches everywhere - there's not a lot of landscape to slow the winds down here , only the occasional wind break and rolling hills - it is wheat & cropping country .

Stopping for some lunch at Indarra Siding - there's a water tap for the use of the travelling public , very thoughtful .

A bit more driving and we found ourselves in the outback , a sign told us so !!

The road got flatter & straighter , the horizon wider and the sky bluer . We did have to share the road with iron ore trucks however , and the odd car . The trucks run night & day , no rest .

We found a free camp beside the road , however it was quite close to the road , so truck noise was ever present . A further consult with Wikicamps and there was another spot about 600m off the road - that would be quieter , so away we went down a gravel road . There was no markers or signs , so we pulled up and got the drone out - ahhh there it is , not far away . Wurarga Dam was built for the railway that went from Mullewa to Cue and Meekatharra . If you look at the following photo you can see what looks like a road from the bottom right to the dam - that's a channel built to deviate water into the dam - there were several others as well - we discovered them when we went for a walk around later .

We had pole position , right beside the dam , high enough that even if it did rain we would be high & dry . As it turned out we had this place to ourselves all night .

There were quite a few of these flowers around the dam .

Night fell and we were treated to a great sunset .

I mentioned road trains earlier carrying iron ore - 4 trailers and 56m long , lots of wheels & tyres - we heard them during the night as they crossed over a cattle grid - it was like a little burst of drums - ratatattat as every set of axles rattled across the grid .

In the morning we were expecting to be woken by the birds , given there was this waterhole right beside us , but no - there were about 5 or 6 little birds , but no more . There has been a lot of aerial baiting for wild dogs , it presumably kills the wild dogs , and a lot of the hawks , kites & eagles as well . This place was eerily quiet when it comes to wildlife .

After breakfast we walked around the site again checking out the engineering that was utilised at the time , this is the remains of one of the many rail bridges .

Onwards to Yalgoo for a fuel top up , then further again to another old rail relic . This time was the remains of a building ( chimney anyway ) and an old siding platform . The railway used to run parallel to the road .

Here's the chimney .

And this is the siding platform.

After lunch it was back on the road again for our next stopover - this one is similar to last night - about 600m from the road , this time it was Flat Rock about 30 kms from the Great Central Hwy . We had this place to ourselves as well !!

Walking up & over the rock to find a good campsite , we discovered some Gnamma holes on top of the rock , still with water from the recent rains .

This hole was larger than most and had some weed and grass , with a small pool of water . Due to the recent rain we decided not to push our luck and camp on the road side of the rock - didn't want to get bogged here !!

Don't get sick of sunsets , or I'm in trouble . I went up on top again , beside some of the gnamma holes and got the best reflections and a super sunset , just before the mosquitoes and midges found me , and drove me off the rock . Lyn decided to look from down below , but she was found by a swarm of midges - about 80 bites later , she was back in the van - I think they followed us in as well , little bastards !!