Day 26 - Telegraph Track (Dulhunty to Ducie)

Today was a but of rest and play, the pan was after breakfast to head south on the track leaving Ernie behind, to cover in the bits of the track that we missed by doing the bypass road.  The aim was to get to Ducie creek if we could.

The track was rough in places, with a few dry creeks to cross.  Stu and Chris were cautious to make sure we were not getting into anything they couldn't get out of and to make sure we could come back along the track to get home.

The anthills were getting bigger here, maybe from less disruption, not sure.

The track follows the telegraph track pretty closely, you see the old poles in varying conditions as you go.  Most are bent over for some reason, some are just cut off and are in the middle of the track ready to stake a tyre!

 A better than average condition telegraph pole ( sorry for the low res image, it's there I promise!)

As we continued down we met a few obstacles that needed further inspection such as North Alice Creek.  Nothing too serious as we discovered but challenging enough to feel this is a proper 4wd track. Katie and the boys managed the bumps well, realising that this wasn't their cup of tea.

(Insert link to video of North Alice crossing)

Ducie creek was a bit more a challenge, not the creek crossing itself but the entry and exits.  But nothing on the scale of Palm!  After a bit of track building by the whole family to remove the bigger drops and dips, in dropped Charlie.

 Chris (and Andi) smoothing the entry from the North

 Katie and Griff collecting stones to fill in a gap of the north entry

Somewhat hairy but we made it across and then back with no issue.  We took videos of the crossing and return so will post these or links to them when we have a chance.

(Insert links to video of the entry and exit)

On the way back we had more of an opportunity for some photo shoots.  This one of Ernie doing a little airtime in a cross over.

We returned back to camp by about 1pm, good to see Ernie all intact with no one being tempted to tamper.  In fact there was no one around at all! We had the place to ourselves.  That was something that surprised us quite a bit, the number of people going up and down the track were in the tens, all coming through Dulhunty and continued on.  It looked like we would have the place to ourselves for the evening.  What a treat!

We spent the afternoon with our chairs creek side watching the boys muck about in the water.  Even after they left due to chills, we stayed on, alternating our feet in the water, so as not to get too chilly.  Sublime!