Gunbarrel Highway to David Carnegie Road and Great Central Road

September 6^th & 7^th

We were awoken this morning by the distant sound of road work trucks rumbling along so we got back on the road pretty early. Our journey today took us a bit further along the Gunbarrel Highway with a detour up another ‘hill’ lookout but we soon turned off onto the David Carnegie Road which had been recommended to us by other travellers we had met at Cape Range National Park. David Carnegie was an explorer and gold prospector in WA who led an expedition (party consisting of five men and nine camels) in 1896 from Coolgardie through the Gibson and Great Sandy Deserts to Halls Creek (most of which was previously unexplored and unmapped) – a total of a journey of 149 days and 1,413 miles (2,274 km). And then back again!!

At the turn off there was a sign and at the bottom of the sign was an old cake tin. What was in the cake tin you ask? Not cake unfortunately but a visitor’s book. We noticed that the last people to pass this way did so three days before so it was evident that we were really going to be going remote by turning off here. And this is what we really love!

We signed the book to say ‘We were here’ and headed south. The track narrowed and deteriorated almost immediately – no graders on this route. It was exceptionally fun driving though – sand, dirt, rocks, wash aways and camels to content with. The driving speed became much slower (between 15-30km/hour) but that makes it better to sit back and enjoy the scenery and what wonderful scenery WA put on for us yet again. Oodles of wildflowers as far as the eye could see interspersed with that incredible red sand with a backdrop of vivid blue sky. Along with the camels and some random kangaroos, there was also a lot of birdlife and the most interesting of these were the Bustards – a large ground bird also commonly known as the Plains Turkey.

On this first night along the David Carnegie Road we camped in a flower garden and wondered how long, if ever, any other humans had stood exactly where we were. We certainly hadn’t passed any other cars on our drive. A ukulele concert, sunset atop a nearby dune and more of those incredible bush starry nights had us extremely content and relaxed.

Had a leisurely get up the next morning and walked up a nearby dune to take in more of the great views then packed up camp and continued along David Carnegie Road. There were a few points of interest to see today however, our success rate in actually finding these sites was variable.

We firstly visited Empress Spring (an underground spring in a hidden cave) which David Carnegie named after Queen Victoria. During his expedition, the party grew very short on water and were finding it difficult to find more. Eventually the dehydrated party came across an aboriginal man, captured him and forced him to direct them to water. They did this numerous times throughout their journey and there was some debate once the party returned to civilisation about Carnegie’s treatment of the native people.

The opening to the spring can be seen from above and there is a chain ladder going down into the dark which you can climb. I started going down but decided better of this after about two rungs so we just posed at the top.

Next interest spot was Breaden Bluff which we drove off the track to look at. The scenery and rocks were very impressive but we weren’t sure that we were actually in the right spot as what we were seeing didn’t actually match up with the description in our trek notes.

Some other highlights in this area are the Pikalu Rock Holes. We followed some 40 gallon drum signs to these rock holes and got out of the car and walked for ages looking for caves which are meant to be huge but we simply couldn’t find them and gave up after a while due to the heat (turns out we were in the completely wrong spot but by the time we were told this we were many kilometres further down the track and weren’t about to go back!).

We completed the David Carnegie Road today (272km).  The road improved greatly towards the end which allowed us to drive a bit faster but we still chose to take our time. We did not see any other cars the entire time we were on this track. At the end of the David Carnegie Road we turned onto the Great Central Road (still dirt but quite wide and recently graded) and started heading east. About 20km along the GCR we stopped in at the Tjukayirla Roadhouse (which claims to be the most isolated roadhouse in Australia) for fuel ($2.00/litre) and homemade cake. We are certainly very keen on all the homemade treats that are available at these outback roadhouses and bakeries, probably a bit too keen according to the tightness of our clothes.

We continued along the GCR for a while and eventually decided to call it quits for the night. We camped just off the road in a borrow pit. A borrow pit in construction and civil engineering, also known as a sand box, is an area where material (usually soil, gravel or sand) has been dug for use at another location. Borrow pits can be found close to many major construction projects of which there are many in this region. Not as bad a spot as it sounds and we created a great meal that evening which we christened ‘Borrowed Panko Chicken’. Ask us to cook it for you sometime – it was really pretty good!