Natural splendour, real musics, wines, wordpower
Blue skies are not the only good skies!
Arguably, this post’s clouded sky is every bit as beautiful as any blue one.
Inarguably, endlessly-unclouded skies would prove lethal to all life on “our” planet…as would “grey skies, nothing but grey skies”.
For humans who enjoy walking in Wilpena Pound – or in any other glorious outback Australian place – the pictured kind of weather is “ideal”, not “poor”.
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Another writer’s words:
If a 17-kilometre-long by eight-kilometre-wide elliptical crown of furiously serrated mountains, with a sunken natural amphitheatre in its centre, were plonked just about anywhere except six hours’ drive north-west of Adelaide, it would surely be a national icon by now.
Wilpena Pound covers eight times the area of Uluru, is 300 metres higher and arguably as culturally significant.
(click here for all of travel journalist Steve Madgwick’s Wilpena Pound: Australia’s unknown icon)
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This post’s photos were both taken as we neared the most easily-accessed section of Wilpena Pound’s rim.
“The Pound”-proper is a prodigious natural amphitheatre.
Various of its mighty ramparts are visible from many vantage points.
However, its interior – the actual Wilpena Pound – is properly visible only to those who walk up into it, or fly over it; to see just how massive and how spectacular it is, you need to climb one of its rim’s higher peaks, or take a flight.
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At 9.03 am we were walking uphill, but easily.
Less than half an hour later, we would be inside Wilpena Pound.
The pictured “grass trees” are neither grasses nor trees.
Xanthorrhoea is an Australian endemic genius of circa 30 species of flowering succulents.
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Conifers and eucalypts both tend to be domineering – they are particularly adept at excluding other kinds of trees.
In the Flinders Ranges, however, one sometimes sees “pines” and “gum trees” thriving, surprisingly near to each other.
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At 8.56 am we were just beginning to walk away from Wilpena Creek, and uphill, towards the “lip” of the actual Wilpena Pound.
As is true of many Eucalyptus species, river red gums are forever-engaged in a cycle of growing and shedding their bark and leaves.
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Clearly evident: this tree is no youngster, it has not merely seen fire and rain, and is still alive, probably some centuries on from the relevant seed’s germination.
Commonly known as the river red gum, Eucalyptus camaldulensis is the most widely-distributed of any eucalyptus species; it is almost-proverbially hardy/“enduring”.
River red gums are the “gum tree” best-beloved by Australian members of Homo sapiens.
In 21st century Australia, this “iconic” species is in big trouble.
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Shortly before we forsook Wilpena Creek, and started to walk uphill (and thence into Wilpena Pound) we encountered the pictured, “permanent” waterhole.
Such places are particularly precious in regions where creeks variously rise, rage, flood, trickle, then cease to flow at all – visibly, at least – for unpredictable periods, sometimes many months…
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This post’s photo was taken just three minutes after the second one in this series’ first post.
By 8.24 am, the ridge tops above Wilpena Creek were no longer mist-shrouded.
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All photos in this series were taken on 05 June 2023.
All locations were within a morning loop-walking distance of Wilpena Resort, or a deal less than one hour’s driving distance from Wilpena Pound.
The Flinders Ranges region is a unique and beautiful part of Australia.
Winter is the best time to go there, and most of it is less than a full day’s drive away from Adelaide.
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