Off to Big Red. Unfortunately a lake had taken up residence across the road just before Little Red so some of the people in the store advised that there was a track round the lake. We were told it needed a good 4WD and it was a bit ‘up and down’. It was virtually all ‘up and down’. It took us an hour to travel the 15 Km round the edge of the lake. We could see where previous explorers had become impatient with the length of the route and had set off across the low flats. We could track their progress by the deep wheel ruts that stopped abruptly without continuing.
As we neared Little Red a voice came over the radio “White vehicle on the far side of the lake.” We wondered if it was the land owner about to admonish us and felt like saying “Who wants to know?” It was two other sets of travellers thinking about doing what we had done. We had quite a chat before we prepared for the ascent. Richard decided not to bother reducing the tyre pressures and as we powered up the dune through the sand our companion started saying “I think I can. I think I can. I’m sure I can. I’m sure I can, I know I can. I know I can.” And we did. There was a spectacular view as a reward. The other side looked much steeper with deeper sand tracks. We had no backup or sand anchors with winch so we chose discretion as the better part of valour.
The birds were spectacular; quite a few big eagles, flocks of small green budgerigars, galahs, corellas and various ducks.
Back at Birdsville we had a late lunch at the Bakery. True to form Richard had to sample a curried camel meat pie. He said it tasted similar to beef.
We found some wood that had not been washed away in the flood so that night we enjoyed a camp fire roasting potatoes for supper.
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