Hay River Track - Simpson Desert trip report

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

After the Bush Tucker tour we were taken out to Goyders Pillar to watch the sunset. This is quite an incredible sight to see as pillar and surrounding ranges change colour to a deep red as the sun goes down.









We went to sleep that night knowing that the next morning we would finally get the chance to enter the Simpson desert and tackle the fabled Hay River track.

[kav Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close kav]

bloody sensational photos jeff .are you a pro photographer ? what camera ?

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

bloody sensational photos jeff .are you a pro photographer ? what camera ?

Thanks Kav, nah not a pro photographer (well, kind of, but from a plane and not really "photography") just a bit of a hobby. I've got a DSLR, a sony a700, few years old now but still does the job.

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

We awoke the next morning to more blue skies, we really hadn't seen a cloud in the sky since White Cliffs, and with the temperatures hovering around the mid to high 20's couldn't have really asked for better weather.

I deliberately didn't read up extensively on the Hay River Track before hand, really only the basics and a general overview of the track and the terrain so I knew what I needed to know, this was mainly because I wanted to experience it first-hand without any preconceived ideas (or ill-informed "advice") to dull the adventure. As a result though I wasn't 100% sure of how the track would play out.

As it turned out, I was quite surprised by the track on the first day, mainly because it was quite overgrown in many places, with tall thick shrubs scratching their way down the sides of the car as I squeezed through. Even though the track had seen more traffic than normal this year due to the Eyre Creek flooding, the traffic hadn't done much to beat back the vegetation, although the track was clearly worse for wear in a few places, with ruts forming along the wheel tracks.



The track did open out a few times, allowing fourth gear to be used occasionally, usually not for long though:


The rains of the last few years have clearly brought the desert vegetation to life:


The Tropic of Capricorn, marked with an expensive plaque. It was while stopped here for a few minutes that a group of people appeared on foot, seemingly out of nowhere. Turns out they'd driven up the track from the South, and had actually followed the river bed up for a quite a distance, only problem was that they were unable to find a track out of the river bed! I can only assume that they eventually found a way out.

Nearing lunch time the track split off, with one track continuing along beside the river, and the other heading down to the river bed. We decided to try and get away from the overgrown shrubs and take the track into the river bed and follow it along for a while:


I'm still working on the videos from the camera I had mounted in the car, I've uploaded a bit of a compilation of the driving from this first section of the track:
http://youtu.be/P0NQy2Dps6Y

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

While the track down the river bed avoided the overgrown vegetation, it presented another problem...the sand was soft, very soft. This meant, even with tyre pressures lowered I really had to keep the boot in it. I don't think I saw the instantaneous fuel consumption reading on the scangauge dip below 50L/100km for the entire time we were in the sand, average was probably around 65! After about 20 minutes of this driving I was starting to calculate fuel burn figures to make sure I still had enough fuel to get through if the river bed driving kept up for much longer!

Thankfully after another 10-15 minutes we reached the turn off to Lake Caroline (helpfully marked by a red-rag tied to a tree).

Lake Caroline was a bit smaller than I imagined...:

In reality the Lake stretched on for some distance to the Horizon, most of it was dry, with a few remnant puddles such as this, although many of the clay pans still looked very soft under the crust.



There were some cool patterns in the mud:


The convoy:

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

After the visit to Lake Caroline we headed back towards the Hay River to find a camp for the night. The river bed was really wide around this area, and we managed to find a spot on the upper level of the river bed to set up camp for the night (yes I know camping on river beds...).
This was probably my pick of the camping spots for the entire trip, just a great location and a feeling of being "out there" in the desert.





The next morning we had this Dingo walking around the edges of the camp, didn't seemed to be the least intimidated or disturbed by our presence, and even seemed to enjoy chasing after the cars as we drove out.

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

Towards the end of the previous day it seemed as though the vegetation was starting to get a little lower and thin out a bit, so we hoped that track today would actually start to open up a bit and allow us to cover a little more ground than the day before.

Well, it didn't! Although the vegetation wasn't as overgrown, the track itself was 5 times as twisty. After the first hour or so of driving the Hay River had narrowed considerably from the wide expanse that we had camped on overnight, to nothing more than a wide creek, full of established Eucalypts(?). Naturally the track wound it's way around every one of these trees and often up the river bank for a short distance, and then back down again.
Even though the driving was quite testing and tiring at times, it was great driving, and exactly the reason I came into the desert.

A straight section of road:


Did I say the track wasn't as overgrown?:

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

Towards the end of the day we did start to break out into much more open terrain, and began to run alongside the sand dunes. Eventually we reached Madigans Blaze Tree, and even though there wasn't much clear, flat ground available for camping we were all ready to set up camp after a tiring days driving:

Some open ground towards the end of the day:


The Blaze tree in the background:


Sand dunes!


One thing that became quite obvious as the day went on was just how incredibly red the sand was becoming. If there is redder sand anywhere else in the world I'd like to see it.


Some stats for the day's driving:
Distance: 123km
Avg Speed: 18kph
Max Speed: 51kph
Fuel use: 15.1l/100

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

This was the day we finally got amongst the sand dunes. The track opened right out, the Hay River disappeared into nothing, and the track then ran parallel to the sand dunes until about midday, only crossing the dunes occasionally.







We came across only the second group of other travelers since leaving Batton Hill, three vehicles heading North:

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

After cresting one particular dune, we came across this massive mob of camels, could have easily numbered 50 plus and in a scene reminiscent of Jurassic Park, they all proceeded to gallop right across the track in front of the cars, bringing us to a complete stop for a few minutes until they all passed through. With one particular big bull keeping a close eye on us as he went past with saliva and froth covering it's entire face.





Once safely past the camels, we reached the shot line, which took us west, straight across 40 or so dunes.

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

After almost three days battling tight and twist tracks we certainly discovered a pleasant surprise when we reached the eastern end of the shot line.

A smooth, clay capped road!

Put in to service the oil wells in the area, this road could not have been better positioned from our point of view, certainly a welcome relief.

The aim for the night was to reach Poeppel Corner and find a camp somewhere its vicinity, so we pushed on down our newly found smooth road and skirted around the edge of a number of big clay pans:




Some of the clay pans still had quite a bit of water, which the bird life seemed to enjoy and make full use of:

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

The sign has certainly seen better days, but it still did it's job and pointed us in the right direction:


After working our way across a few more sand dunes and clay pans we reached our destination of Poeppel Corner:




A replica of the original (incorrectly positioned) corner post:

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

We found a nice little spot not far from the corner, in amongst the dunes, and went to bed that night knowing we had just completed the Hay River Track, and consequently, we had crossed the Simpson North-South. All that remained was to know cross the Simpson East-West. How hard can it be...?

Camp amongst the dunes at Poeppels:


From the turn off on the Plenty Highway to Poeppels Corner, we had covered about 570km's, and with an average fuel economy of about 14.5L/100k down the track it looked like I would easily make it out of the desert and to Mt Dare without even having to resort to using the diesel in the Jerry Cans. The two Patrols on the hand were beginning to wonder whether they would be able to make it. Especially with the soft sand dunes of the French Line still to come.

And so it begins...


The plan was to take the French Line, seeing as it was the most direct way out of the desert, and to complete it in 2 days, with one night spent in the desert and the next at Dalhousie Springs. It would have been great to take more time for the crossing, but with the change in plans due to Eyre Creek, this is how it had to be.

The French Line stretches into the distance:


The base of a sand dune, this became a familiar site over the next two days:

[andoland Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close andoland]

Great report mate, looks like you had a fantastic trip. We drove the Hay River track in 2009 and it is one of the best trips I have done. How long did you take from Batton Hill to Poeppel Corner? We took 8 days to get from Birdsville to Batton Hill (I think 6 days from Lake Poeppel to Batton Hill) and while you could do it faster I thought that was nearly perfect.

The big wet seasons over the last couple of years have really brougt on the vegetation. There was almost none on the track when we went through and I don't remember any stretches where we had bushes scraping the sides of the car, but we did the CSR this year and the vegetation was incredible.

Look forward to the rest of the pics.

Ando

[JeffH Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close JeffH]

Great report mate, looks like you had a fantastic trip. We drove the Hay River track in 2009 and it is one of the best trips I have done. How long did you take from Batton Hill to Poeppel Corner? We took 8 days to get from Birdsville to Batton Hill (I think 6 days from Lake Poeppel to Batton Hill) and while you could do it faster I thought that was nearly perfect.

Ando

We took three days took get from Batton Hill to Poeppels, which meant there were some long days in the saddle. I don't like rushing things on trips like this and at least 1 extra day on the Hay River track would have been welcome, but with the change of plans due to the flooding meaning we had to head up to the North first and then come back down the track it meant this was how it had to be.