Review: Skytrek

Having visited willow Springs last July, I was just revisiting my photos of the trip and thought I would share with anyone interested some of the words from my Blog:
Arkaroola to Willow Springs Station.
The drive south was a relatively easy one, driving along with the ranges on our ride hand side. Willow Creek had been highly recommended by a couple of fellow travelers and is written about in Ron and Viv Moon’s book “Flinders Ranges”. On arrival we were met by one of the owners, Carmel.
Willow Creek is a working sheep station run by Carmel and her husband Brendan. They are the nicest people. Like all farmers in the area they have done it tough throughout the drought and have turned to tourism to help supplement the income.
We planned to spend one night there, but extended to two and would have made it more if we were not due to start the journey home. There is something for everyone at Willow. There is a camping/caravan area with good facilities and a camp kitchen. We chose the “Corella” bush site which was just sensational.
We were totally on our own. Even if the second camp had someone in it, the sites are so separated you would only glimpse people through the trees, about 200 metres away. All of the bush camps have a long drop loo, brilliant fire pits and hot plates.
There are well-marked and graded walks, but the hi-light for us was the 76.3 kilometer “Skytrek” self drive (4wd only) trip, which we booked in for the next day. Carmel said to allow 6 hours for the trip and you must leave by 10:30.
We actually had an early start for us (9:30), as we wanted to make the most of the day. Brendan gave us a thorough briefing
and checked our car out. There are excellent mud maps provided and a booklet listing over 40 well-marked, numbered stops,
with great track notes. You are given a key to the gates, which is also their check on people returning.
The range of country you travel is staggering, and as good as any scenery we have seen in the Flinders, and that is a big statement!
There are historic huts, ochre cliffs, beautiful dry creek beds and aboriginal etchings, dating back 20 or 30,000 years.
Toward late afternoon, we realised were making too many stops, and noticed the time getting away from us.
As we climbed to the top of the of the hills, we radioed in (UHF Radio Repeater 4 – Willow Springs Station- 493) to let them
know we were o/k and would be a bit late returning, they were appreciative of the call and probably stopped
Brendan getting on his bike to head out to find us.
To do the trek, you do need a reliable 4WD preferably with reasonably high clearance and some knowledge of 4 wheel driving.
You only need to engage 4WD on a couple of occasion, but you really do need it as some of the slopes are long with loose stones.
An on-board compressor is essential as you will need to air down and up to save your tyres. I ran 26 on all 4.

Willow Springs Station is a place we will definitely return to. As there are limited camp sites, I would suggest booking in.