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Published: September 3rd 2013
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Red roads, red rocks and red anthills, red Roos and visiting volcanoes.My main roads engineer friends would be impressed the great inland road is red. Everything is red. the road is very good, apart from a small number of roadworks sites along the way we have made excellent time.So a road train drives past the Fletcher creek camping area at 5:30am. Just to get his jollies or because he couldn't help himself, he sat on the horn for the entire length of the camping ground. We were awake, but I am pretty sure there would have been a few startled grey nomads in their luxurious caravans, strategically parked all over the place. Grey nomads only travel between ten and two I swear. At 10:12 we just saw about ten vans in convoy, they are very active at this time of day.
I have never
seen so much road kill and so many suicidal animals. Yesterday a Red Roo stood in the middle of the road playing chicken. It had its own special kind of marsupial arrogance. We lost we had to come to almost a dead set as he gave us the "evil eye of Skippy" lifted nose up, snubbed us, clapped its little skippy front paws together and almost swaggered away.
It must be the surveyors eye because Wayne caught sight of an emu by the side of the road just after we departed this morning He slowed down because it was looking rather skittish, and as we drew up next to us it wanted to race us. It took off beside us road runner style. Wayne a man who likes to compete took off to get away from him as we were worried he might dive under the wheels of the car.
The birds are spectacular and varied. We have seen a fair bit of the pecking order driving along this road as for the birds in particular the carnivorous ones the road kill buffet is sumptuous. The Wing span of the wedge tailed eagle is something to see, he
waits quite a while to fly away as we fly down the road towards him, he casually jumps up as if he is coming back down right behind us like a high jumper. Their tails are beautiful. We've seen falcons and hawks and the ever present harbinger of doom the black crows (many many " murders" of them)..black cockatoos screech around the place and rainbow lorikeets are abundant. And the possums are fat and happy.
The anthills are interesting they range from fat and dome shaped to conical shaped to phallic like. All red shades some red and black striped some red and white, some red and ochre colored. The earth here bleeds red, vibrant, stark and making everything seem hot.
Anyone who knows me well, knows I have a passion for rocks and geology. Thanks to Dennis my brother who brought me home a bucket of polished gemstones when I was a little girl. Geological features fascinate me and so a visit to the Undara national park to see the lava tubes underground was on my bucket list. It's way more than I expected. These massive subterranean tunnels are the result of a gentle shield volcanic eruption
which spewed out lava down the water courses in this flat plain about 7 million years ago. That's recent in vilcano speak.
The amazing thing about the tube is that the lava as it flowed along, cooled on the outside and formed a crust thereby creating in effect a pipe for the molten lava inside to flow through even further along the water course. When the activity ceased and no more lava left, it just flowed out and left only the tunnel like an empty pipe. Gradually grasses and trees took hold above the tunnels. and if you were walking along the plains you would have no idea this wonderful Hadean world exists. Eventually through water erosion and gravity some of the rooftops gave way and created tiny pockets of remnant rainforest where the earth sunk The tubes are huge. The ceilings are patterned beautifully in black, mustard, pink and white colours of odd formless shapes.
The area is pocked with volcanos all extinct not only shield volcanoes, there are no pyroclastic volcanoes here but there a cones which dot the landscape as well.
Before exploring the tubes we climbed MT kalkani an extinct volcanic cone in the
middle of a field. When you reach the rim you can see the surrounding landscape and other cones in the area. Turn around and you will look deep into the extinct cauldron.
So happy that ticked off one of my bucket list.
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