What NOT to miss around Painted Desert??

"The Breakaways" just out of Coober Pedy then on to the Painted desert and Oodnadatta. If it's not to hot you can do that including some walks easily in a day.

If you have a few (?) spare dollars an evening flight out of William Creek to the Painted Hills is well worth while (you can not get into the Painted Hills by road). About 10 km sth of William Creek you can duck in behind the second sand dune for an overnight bush camp. Easy parking about 100 m off the road. An old Ghan siding at Beresford is an interesting stop, usually a lot of bird life around the dribbling bore pipe.

Mound Springs Conservation Park is interesting, about an hour should cover that.

Very nice camp area (flush toilet) behind the old ruins at Farina. Honesty box for a camp fee. I think the camp area is looked after by the station owner, far better then the gravel car park CP at Lyndhurst.

The road into the Flinders from Copley has very sharp stones but them's the breaks some get punctures some don't :-))

If you should take the road down to Yunta (on the Peterborough - Broken Hill Rd.) stop in at the Waukaringa ruins. You can follow a track up onto the ridge where there are some old mine ruins - nice view.

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Signman,

If you're stopping over in Coober Pedy, when ready to head out toward Oodnadatta, instead of taking the Coober Pedy to Oodnadatta track, head north along the bitumen (Stuart Highway) for about 20 klms, then turn right at the sign for the Breakaways.
About 6 klms in you will come across alookout area overlooking the escarpment and the "Moonplains" below.
Follow the track which takes you down onto the Moonplains, past mica fields and eventually along the Dog Fence.
You will reach a T-Junction with the Coober Pedy - Oodnadatta Track. Turning right will take you back to Coober Pedy, but turning left you cross the fence and head toward Oodnadatta.
From this point you can follow the Treknotes for the Painted Desert available on this site.

You will only add a couple of hours at most to the "normal" Treknote journey and the Breakaways view and the drive across the Moonplains will be a highlight of your trip, guaranteed.
The track is easy going even if towing.

After the Painted Desert detour you can rejoin the Coober Pedy - Oodnadatta Track and continue on to Oodnadatta and then east along the Oodnadatta Track through William Creek. William Creek has an iconic pub and is worth a night or two's stopover. This is a good base to take a trip out to Halligan Bay on Lake Eyre, the lowest point below sea level in Australia. You may even like to take a trip with Trevor Wright of WrightAir in his plane. He has a couple of interesting options. One is a flight across Anna Creek station to the Painted Desert which gives a totally different perspective on what you have seen from the road.
Another trip he offers is a flight over the edge of Lake Eyre and the Simpson Desert to Dalhousie Springs for a leisurely dip, then to the Pink Roadhouse for lunch, probably being picked up from the Airfield in the Pink Roadhouse's limousine. (pink Volvo stationwagon)

Oodnadatta is interesting for a Pink Roadhouse burger and a stroll along the town's one main street, but if camping, I would recommend staying a few kilometres out of town at the Algebuckina Waterhole, opposite the heritage listed Bridge of the same name.

So, from Coober Pedy, at least one night at Arkaringa homestead with a trip out towards dusk to see the sunset over the Painted Desert, a one night stopover at Algebuckina Waterhole, then one or two nights at William Creek. (we stayed three nights here 'cos we loved the feeling of remoteness, the trip out to Halligan Bay and the two flights which were wrapped up in a package deal, we couldn't resist.

Continue along the Track to Maree, Lyndhurst (back on the blacktop) and Copley., but plan for an occasional "side trip" to visit Coward Springs, Blanche Cup and The Bubble Springs and a host of other attractions along The Track.

Hope this gives you some input to your planning.

Bill

I'd avoid Coober Pedy - its the pits :-)

You could head west and sample the start of the Anne Beadell Hwy. Maybe as far as Emu if you have time.

Bob

Coober Pedy has lots of interest, and a unique atmosphere. Certainly worth visiting at least once.

About 1 k west of the Coward Springs gate is one of the most isolated grave sites I have seen. There are three graves dating to before the turn of the last century. I am sure that most travellers in that area would not know of it's existence. You can drive in but it's not that far for an early morning walk from the Coward Springs camp site which has free fire wood.GPS Coords are S29 24.560 and E 136 48.236. I found it thanks to Geocaching.com.
M.

Dave - it's you ! Not a bad trip you have outlined there - as you can see above, lots of members have been up there a lot ! BTW - the westprint heritage maps for that area have heaps of good spots too see, detailed on the back. Weather permitting, it's great country - plenty of dead set remote outback Aussie territory. When you get back down to Lyndhurst, if you're hankering for a taste of the lower Strzelecki , you could consider a run up as far as Mt Hopeless and then around to Balcanoona via Moolawatana station - a public road...... its a fair run though, all up. Down to Copley and then east to Balcanoona would be a lot kinder on the hardware though - the lower Strz can be a trial on tyres at times, unless taken very easy. (pics of the Strz surface on my site page - http://users.picknowl.com.au/~darian)
Re the Gammons Nat Pk (Arkaroola) - Grindel's Hut and Weetootla were nice drives in, with good camping spots.
Guess you will exit to Yunta across the badlands from Balcanoona and then off home east ..... we'd better hear from you on the HF skeds :-o) !

Just don't miss dawn and dusk out amongst the hills. The colour is what it is all about.