Canning Stock Route 2004

Saturday 28^th August.

Warren refilled a water container from Georgia Bore, but ended up tipping the water out, to rescue a frog that went into the container from the bore pipe. Heading east on the Talawana Track brought us to Well 23. This was near the fuel dump where unleaded fuel awaited us, but no diesel. Warren phoned the Capricorn Roadhouse and he used a drum marked for Rogers, with permission. Alan and Colin shared the unleaded fuel. We used 75 litres, Colin filled his tank and the rest went into jerry cans. At the dump the line up of full drums consisted of 20 full 200 litre drums of diesel, 4 drums of unleaded and 1 of ultimate fuel. Also there were 24 empty diesel drums, 2 unleaded and 2 ultimate. After leaving the fuel dump we saw 5 camels on the roadside. At last!!  We knew they were around as we had seen many tracks in the sand previously.   Stopping at Well 24 (Curara Soaks), we were delighted to see a carpet of strong pink daisy like flowers. This area was an aboriginal meeting place. Next stop was at the junction with a Windy Corner sign and a bottle with only a few business cards in it. Our track now headed north on the CSR again to Well 25, which was dry, derelict and filled with sand. There were some very big clay pans in the area. All three vehicles got stuck on one particular sand dune, but succeeded on the second try. Some sand dunes were extremely rough in this section and the cccorrrugggatttions were there too. Well 26 (Tiwa) was surveyed by Alfred Canning on his 1906 – 1907 trek. 51 wells were constructed in 1908 – 1910 and the stock route was last used in1958. This well was restored in July 1983 and had a camel carrier included in the memorial. Many finches were here and Alan rescued one very wet little bird from the water in the trough. There was a visitors book here to sign and approximately 230 had been there in 25 days. Our next stop was at Slate Range where there were many pieces of slate on the ground in various colours. On one of the sand hills there was a camel standing the limited shade of a tree, chewing his cud. We continued on to Well 27 which was disused. Following this were some extremely rough sand hills, but off the track there were the most beautiful wind blown ripples in the sand, “like a real desert”, said Colin. Well 28 was next on the list and it was a small depression  with some derelict  equipment  remains. Today was really camel day. We saw quite a few groups of camels and they varied a lot in colour.  We collected  firewood for the night and continued  to our campsite near Thring Rock,  and we arrived just before sunset, which gave us some  spectacular views as the shadow moved over the claypan. Colin invented a new word for canned food meals. They are now called "tindins". 

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