This Article was written by Ilona Booth some years back

BY AUSTIN 7 TO INNAMINCKA Page 2 Back to page1

Arriving just on dark we swooped in and flung up our tents near the 'park' shelter, made a meal and sat round for a bit in the cold (gets very cold in the desert). There was no firewood around, but a torchlight foray yielded enough to warm us. Water is an ever present problem - we were able to scrounge a four litre can from the pub at Milparinka, all they could spare, and some dark brown stuff from Tibooburra- they're out of fresh water. There was bore water at the park which we boiled and let stand and then poured off the clear stuff. Had no ill effects in our tea. OLIVE DOWNS to INNAMINCKA the hard way.Next morning our early start beat the arrival of the ranger with our firewood - met him on the way in. He told us the road up ahead was good. It was, eventually, all the way to the dog-proof fence at Warri Gate, on the Queensland border, where it disintegrated. The landscape was like the surface of the moon

We pedalled our little cars over the desert all day on roads that ranged from bad to awful, never quite sure where we were. At one stage, when passing through a station, we came to a fork in the track, with a 'road closed' sign lying wantonly between the two tracks. Had to call into the station and ask, and they told us "Don't take any notice of that - been there for five years !". Scrounged a few litres of petrol as the going had been harder than anticipated, and took the road they said "could get to Innamincka in two and a half hours in a modern". It was finally a superb top gear road, which in the fullness of time found us in an oilfield, where a passing worker in a truck took us back to a track signposted Innamincka Bore. "Only an hour", he said. Late afternoon we got sick of struggling along, trying to fit the two wheeltracks in the sand, getting out to push in the heavier sand dunes, pulled up to the side of the road and made camp. NOTHING passed either way all night, and as we broke camp next morning a 4x4 ute drove up. Said they'd been following our tracks, trying to imagine what had made them - even thought of wheel barrows. Saw where we had got out to push on the sandhills. They were fascinated. The reason why nobody had gone by was that this road really was closed, we were supposed to go through the oilfields to the Lyndhurst track, good fast dirt road all the way, but longer. INNAMINCKA. OPENING OF THE RESTORED INLAND MISSION HOSPITAL Arrived in Innamincka about 11. The 'town' is a general store and a pub, but they have a new ablution block - sort of round like a couple of cement tanks - of which we very smartly made use. Camped a little way up the road on the 'riverbed'. The place is well camped out. There is, of course, no firewood for miles. There are big bus camps down by the other side of the riverbed, each busload holding about 40 bods. Cooked our steak on next door's fire, went back there after dinner to sit by their fire. Full moon, saw a dingo trot by as we came home. It had been rumored that the army was setting up toilets for the campers, but someone forgot to tell them. Ever resourceful, they knocked up these plywood partitions (about waist high) dug holes in the ground and provided a seat. Of course the 'ladies' faced the army settlement. The 'men's' had an amazing device I wish I had photographed. Must have very tall blokes in the army. Dingoes howled at the moon through the night. Broke out the clean clothes we had been saving til we'd been purified with a shower and went to town to see and be seen. Left our cars parked and went home for lunch. Had to move the cars because that was where the Flying Doctor parked his plane. There were the regulation speeches from ex-doctors, nurses, reverends, dignitaries Dick Smith and general celebratory stuff. Ordered a dinner for the evening and went back to camp to rest up for the evening party. The usual population of 12 - 14 has swelled to 3000 - thought we may not get fed, but they actually managed to feed just on 300 in a little over half an hour. After dinner we joined the huge campfires in what would be a beer garden anywhere else. These were large circles of stones with enormous fires, around which were a variety of folk talking, singing, playing bagpipes, mouthorgans or guitars and generally celebrating. It was interesting to hear the outdoor barman ask of his customers "Are you flying?". Walked a bit in the bright moonlight before bed. Memorable night. There was a memorial service at the Mission Hospital in the morning. Drove up to the town for supplies and fuel. When Peter came out of the store he found himself parked under the wing of a plane which had parked beside him at the pump. The boys went off stealing firewood from departed camp sites, but as it turned out we were invited to after dinner coffee in a huge Winnabego thing, and didn't need it.

LYNDHURST TRACK, through the oil fields to the CORNER,& FORT GREY Packed so well in the morning that we could actually see out of the back window - not that it helped because we were so loaded that the rear view mirror only looked at the basket on the back. The Lyndhurst road turned out to be a super fast dirt track, after all the dismal reports we'd had. They should have come the way we did!. Everyone had a different story, recemmended different tracks. Some of the 4x4 drivers had lots of punctures, but then they would have been overloaded and also they have these fancy tyres with big gaps in the tread. Easy to get a kangaroo bone in the tyre. They were amazed that we'd had no trouble in this area. Our vintage wheels were too skinny and light to damage themselves, but we did have trouble with broken spokes and the skinny wheels didn't like the corrugations and gibber stones, or crabbing along a steeply crowned sand road.

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