After a morning hiking in the searing heat of Kings
Canyon, James and I filled the car up with $2.26/L unledded and started out on
the Mereenie Loop with the plan to head back up towards Alice via the West Macs
along Namatjira Drive. There is an
alternate path back up into Alice via the Larapinta Drive which passes by Palm
Valley and Hermannsberg but we decided against that this trip. Because much of the loop between Kings and Glen
Helen passes through Aboriginal land you need to get a permit to drive the
route. That’s simple enough to do
though, you can buy them from the little store at Kings and it’s only $5.50 per
vehicle (or the cost of 2 litres of fuel).
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| Watch out for the wildlife along the Mereenie Loop |
Most of the Mereenie road is unsealed and parts of it are
quite corrugated but nothing compared to going up to the Mitchell Plateau so
I’m not complaining. We were comfortably
able to maintain pretty reasonable speeds.
I’m told most people do it in about three hours though there was a pair
of French people who managed to take 6.
I’m not quite sure how they managed to drag it out so long. You do need to watch out for wildlife
though. We saw several herds of wild
horses running about over the road as well as donkeys and cattle and I’m pretty sure one of those would leave
a mark on your car if you smacked into them.
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| Who said clothes don't grow on trees? |
Although the scenery along the loop is quite pretty and
it’s interesting watching the landscape change there isn’t terribly much you
can stop off to see. There is a little
lookout high on a hill not far from The Canyon where you are allowed free
overnight bush camping (52J GU 44875 36934) but the view is actually better
from the road either side of the official lookout/camping area which is badly
obscured by trees. Also if you are all out of clean nickers you
might be interested in stopping by the tree at 52K GU 97064 54904.
One place worthy of a little stop off if you have a 4WD
is Gosse Bluff within the Tnorala Conservation Reserve. The car park there is located only 6
kilometres off of the main road. Tnorala
reserve is managed jointly by the Northern Territory Parks and Wildlife
Commission and the Western Arrente people.
So while there are some picnic facilities present like tables, shade and
toilets there are also some areas of the reserve of special importance which
are off limits to the more pasty folk like myself.
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| Inside Gosse Bluff |
The large ring of hills which is the focal point of the
reserve came about as the result of a terrible accident. During the Dreamtime a large group of stars
from the Milky Way took the form of women and were performing a ceremonial
dance across the sky. During the dancing
one of the mothers put her baby down to rest in his wooden baby carrier
(turna). To her horror the turna fell
out of the dancing area and plunged down towards the ground. The infant tipped out of the turna which then
landed on top of him. The child and
turna landed with such an impact that that the earth and rocks where they
landed were forced upwards in a great heaving motion. Here they stayed forming the walls of Tnorala
(Gosse Bluff). As a punishment for the
carelessness the Milky Way was covered with sand in an attempt to hide it from
view. Tormented by their loss the
Evening Star (the child’s Mother) and the Morning Star (his Father) are still
searching for their missing child today.
However the less imaginative would try and have you
believe that the unique formation of hills resulted from the impact of a
massive ancient comet. The impact force
pushed the outer walls of the ring hundreds of metres high into the air. Since the craters formation millions of years
ago, erosion has reduced it to the structure we see today.
The satellite imagery of the area makes for pretty
interesting viewing. However it can be a
little hard from inside much of Gosse Bluff to get a feel for the magnitude of
the structure around you. But if you
take the marked walk from the car park there is a lookout on a slightly raised
plot of land that gives you a relatively unobstructed view of the ring of hills
around you (53K KP 26308 63272). If you
are still having trouble seeing the hills there its probably a result of the
flies in your eyes. No that’s not a
Catch 22 joke, those sticky little buggers were absolutely everywhere and loved
to crawl in behind our sunglasses and try and get up our noses.
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| The lookout offers a fairly unobstructed view of the ring of hills |
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| The view of Gosse Bluff from Tyler's Pass |
For those who only have a 2WD vehicle don’t fret too
much. You might not be able to get into
the centre of the Bluff but a bit further north along the main road there is a
turnoff up the hill to a lookout at Tyler’s Pass (53K KP 31282 79674). The view back down over Gosse Bluff is pretty
spectacular which makes it a none too bad spot to stop off for lunch. Unfortunately I didn’t have a camera that
could really to the view justice though so I guess you’ll just have to go see
it for yourself.
Visited 30.01.2014
