The “while we are here” kept growing, this time to include a revisit to Flinders Ranges so I could see the fossils I missed out on before. We had been told by friends in Victoria that there were loads of fossils in the ranges, and I had forgotten to look for them while we were there before. On the way over there, though, I decided I needed another doctor visit (rash/fungus infection still hadn’t gone away), so I scheduled one in Port Augusta. The online system didn’t end up working, but they were able to get me in anyway. This cost $60AUD and my doctor was a man with a heavy accent, but he prescribed a strong steroid cream. The doctor let me know that this should cure it within one week, but if it didn’t, I would need another doctor visit and some tests. And, that it may be reoccurring, since he is only treating the symptoms with the cream and doesn’t know the cause. Well, hopefully, this one will be effective.
Of course, in my mind, when someone says “fossils,” I have delusions of great, complete skeletons, just barely unearthed in stone. For example, as they did in the exhibition in Dinosaur National Monument in Colorado. I loved that place! They have unearthed whole, mostly-intact skeletons there and left them in the ground, so you can see what it is like for an archeologist. That is what I keep hoping for when people tell me I can see fossils. Sadly, the fossils that you can see in Flinders Range National Park are not at all like that. Not to say they aren’t still amazingly awesome, but that they weren’t for what I was hoping.
Instead, you drive down Brachina Gorge Road and are introduced to the layers of rock formed millions of years ago. So long ago, in fact, that most of the vertebrate species of “dinosaurs” weren’t around yet. The life that was captured in those old rocks were very old forms of life. For example, the sponge-like archeocyaths that lived in warm shallow seas. So the fossils are more just impressions in the limestone that was lying around. Jonathan was really good at spotting them. Me, not so much.
The area is beautiful, and we enjoyed our fossicking. We even went for a stroll along the Trezona Hike. Along this hike is the “golden spike”, a point that marks the beginning of the Ediacaran Period, which marks the oldest evidence of animal life on Earth. This period was the first new geologic period to be defined in 120 years (and the only one based upon rocks found in the southern hemisphere). Quite the find!
You can see the boring holes they used to obtain core samples above the golden spike marker.
Remember the living stromatolites we found in Western Australia? These are fossilized ones!
We met some emus along the way.
Ringneck parrot in the trees.
You see the two tall peaks there in the middle? We hiked to the saddle between them three months prior (Apr-15-2017).
Finished with the park, the next day, we decided to visit some nearby gorges and hit up a restaurant that served bush food.
Wanting to try some exotic meat that I normally wouldn’t get, we ate the Feral Mixed Grill special at the Prairie Hotel. The flavors/textures were interesting. Not something I would probably get all the time, but not something I would be disgusted by eating. The kangaroo had the best texture, but was kinda bland. The rest had good flavor, but poor texture.
As the image suggests, we ate camel sausage, emu mignon, and kangaroo filet.
After that we said goodbye again to the Flinders Ranges. The Flinders Ranges used to be (millions of years ago) massive mountains. But erosion has worn down the peaks so that all that remains are the edges of the bases. In the panorama below, you can see how the hills on the left have layers going diagonally from the bottom left to the top middle. The hill layers on the right are a mirror image (bottom right to the top middle). That would have been one massive mountain in between them.
We were now at a crossroads. We knew we wanted to head north to be in Cape York before October, but, unbeknownst to our family, we were planning a trip back to the USA to see the eclipse! However, that had some complications because we had to figure out the best way to get to Sydney, and find a place to safely stow our van. After weighing our options (Cairns, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, and even other regional airports), we decided on either Cairns or Melbourne, as they were the cheapest. That made it easiest to choose Melbourne, as Jonathan wanted to scope out some 4x4 Sprinter vans, and we had a contact in Melbourne who had a bunch. That made it our last item on our “while we are this far…” agenda. And we started on our way east to Melbourne.
As a special treat, the town from which we exited South Australia housed a wildlife park that had white Western Grey Kangaroos (apparently this white gene is dominant)!
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