Day 5...

Day 5 With it being day 14 I figure its about time that I get round to writing day 5 up so I can post the 5 other days I've written up already. We woke in Cadney Homestead after a good meal in the roadhouse and a some wine between us. The night had been a reasonably good one with the tent pitched on grass. As was beginning to become a habit, I woke much before Rob but not much before we needed to leave. Once I'd showered and packed my tent away he finally stirred and set about having a shower and packing his swag bag away. Rob had managed to find his debit card the night before, although much to his annoyance it wasn't intact. Once both up we checked the cars oil and coolant levels while debating what to do with the roof rack - keep it in the car or ditch it somewhere. I suspected that we would need the roof rack if we needed to return the car to Travellers AutoBarn so we opted to keep it. The oil and coolant were both running low, so much so the oil was barely registering on the dip stick. A quick check of the garage found neither - that and neither me or Rob had thought to find out which oil the car needed, not our smartest move. Regardless of the lack of fluids in the car we pressed on. Our route was to back track down the Stuart a little and jump back into the Oodnadatta track out to Mt Arckaringa in the pained desert. We'd both agreed we needed to be back at a midway split in the track by about midday so that we would have enough time to get to our camp stop for the evening. The route was as all other tracks have been so far, fantastic and so engaging to drive. I started and the car was in 2WD to start with, but about 40 mins in I needed to change to 4WD high as the back of the car was squirming in the sand and loose gravel. It took about 1.5hours to get out to the hills on the ribbon-esk road. We arrived to find we were the only people around, probably for miles. The route up to the parking was mostly like the track so far except for one innocent looking bend which, as you got round the corner the road just fell away, about a 6ft drop at about a 45 degree angle. Thankfully I'd managed to drag my eyes away from the stunning hills looming over us and back to the road in time to stop. Rob didn't and snapped back to the Rob in a panic to find the road absent in front of us. Regardless we went down it, being in a 4WD drive car, without any issues or event the slightest hint of a shudder. We parked up and got out, changing my attire from shorts to jeans, and filpflops to shoes as the walk was bushy and stony and we were off. Guessing st the route we walked along a dry river bed before finding our first "sign". It was an arrow laying on the ground made from darker stones than the path, it seemed we were to follow them. The path took us up to the top of the hills with incredibly spectacular views out over the surrounding area and hills. We managed to kill over an hour wondering the hilltop taking endless photos of the endless flat terrain other than the hills we were stood on. The edges were shingle, straight drops of a combination of the two of them. I was a little disappointed not to have found a snake while wondering around, I can but hope to find one on one of our other walks we will no doubt take. I got talking to a group of Australian's who had turned up shortly after we had started walking. they had come from Kings Canyon and a place called Palm Valley which they highly recommend, but warned you would need a 4WD car - this only increased my want to visit. After a while of chatting we headed back to the car to start our return trip to Cadney Homestead and on up the Stuart highway towards Uluru. The return trip offered us a change to compare both mine and Rob's driving as it would be the same route back as it was out, and we knew what time it had taken me. Needless to say Rob managed to get back to the Stuart highway in a faster time than I had taken to get out to Mt Arckaringa. To me this proved that his driving was the more aggressive but in true Rob style he found any reason he could think of as to why it had taken him less time like using 4WD in parts I hadn't and so on - its still a point we disagree in through to today. Once back on the motorway we made track north to Maria for fuel and lunch. After much needed food and water we were to be hitting the motorway through to Curtain Springs, our campsite for the night. We knew we wouldn't make if there in one go, it was too far for our thirsty car to make with out another fuel stop. We ended up stopping in Erldunda which was a petrol station just as we turned left onto the Lasseter Highway. Mercifully they had oil and a helpful sheet to go with which told us which oil we needed, they also had coolant topups. We also picked up some ice and ice creams roo, although either of us actually remembered to pick the ice up from the freezer outside - not that we noticed for some hours later. we managed to make Curtin Springs just as the sun set but it turned out to be a fairly crap nights sleep for both of us...