KAYAKING THE WARBURTON CREEK AND TREKKING LAKE EYRE

Ben and Tim are
currently editing
together a documentary
about this journey.  It is
expected to be
completed in early 2005
and will be screened as
part of several
presentations around
Australia.  Dates and
venues will be posted
on the homepage of this
website when they have
been finalised.

In January and February 2004 the normally parched channel country of western Queensland received heavy rainfall.  The resultant floodwaters flowed towards Lake Eyre in north east South Australia via the Diamantina, Cooper and Georgina river systems.  The Diamantina and Georgina Rivers converge some 250 kilometres northeast of the lake to form the Goyder Lagoon.  From here the floodwaters flowed onward as the Warburton Creek.  By the middle of March water had begun spilling into Lake Eyre for the first time since 2000.  It might not flow down the Warburton again for another 8-10 years.

In early April, Tim Jarvis and I drove more than a 1000 kilometres north from Adelaide to meet the Warburton Creek where it flowed through a sheep and cattle station known as Kalamurina.  We prepared to launch kayaks not far from Kalamurina homestead, at a point almost 200 kilometres upstream from the Warburton’s Lake Eyre mouth.  Our final destination, however, was the southernmost point of Halligan Bay on the western shore of Lake Eyre, about a hundred kilometres southwest of where the Warburton emptied into the lake.  We anticipated the journey would take us eight days.  

At Kalamurina the Warburton was 30 metres wide and flowing at about 3 kilometres per hour.  From the staining of riverside foliage we could see that the water level had dropped more than two metres from its peak.  Where they had been inundated the riverbank sediments had turned to mud.

It was early afternoon by the time we'd packed the kayaks to our satisfaction and pushed off from the bank.  Equipment filled the compartments at the bow and stern of each kayak and was also strapped tightly to the deck.  As we paddled past riverside stands of Eucalypts and Melaleuca, there seemed little to distinguish the Warburton from rivers to be found in the wetter regions of Australia. On that first day we paddled beyond the fall of darkness and continued for another hour by the light of the rising moon, savouring both the seclusion and a sense of great privilege.

Next morning, when we tried switching on the fully dried out device, neither of us was surprised to find that it emitted not the faintest flicker of life.  Our EPIRB (emergency beacon) remained in perfect working order, but from that point on we would be unable to communicate with our support team and keep them updated on our progress.  It meant that we had to make it to the pre-arranged pick-up point, the southern end of Halligan Bay, on the day we had predicted we would.  Gone was our option to bring forward or push back the rendezvous date depending on how quickly or slowly we progressed down the Warburton and across Lake Eyre.

We committed ourselves to long days on the water.  On average, we would be away by 7:30am and nudging shore around 6:30pm.  The Dagger Edisto, which I had borrowed from Scotch College in Adelaide, ranks as the first kayak not to give me pins and needles in at least one leg after several

minutes of sitting in the cockpit.  The only time we needed to get out was for filming, photography or to go to the toilet.  For rest and lunch breaks we simply positioned the kayaks side by side and drifted downstream.  Even with the loss of one to two hours of paddling time per day to camera-work, Tim and I still managed to cover more than 50 kilometres in an 11 hour period.       

At the site of our launch, the relative absence of birdlife had been noticeable.  But this quickly changed as we progressed downstream.  Several times each day we would spot the long neck of a darter lunging snake-like through the water before disappearing below the surface to continue fishing.  Galahs and mulga parrots supplied splashes of colour to logs and other dead wood.  Small insectivores twittered amongst the tangle of lignum.  And black kites regularly circled the sky above or else could be seen perched in the coolibahs and river red gums, vantage points from which they would occasionally swoop to snare an unwitting fish in their talons.

Flashes of orange-brown between the riverside foliage signalled the hasty retreat of dingoes, timid creatures that were frightened by our passage.  At one point, however, a family of them dog paddled across the Warburton, just metres in front of our kayaks.  But perhaps the most enchanting interlude with local wildlife involved coming face to face with a southern boobook owl, one that was attempting to roost discreetly in a shrub shaded beneath an overhang of hardened clay sediments.       

On the flipside, the Warburton Creek harboured the densest and most aggressive fly population that Tim and I have ever encountered.  They molested us from before the sun’s first rays had licked over the horizon until well after dusk.  I refused to wear mesh netting on my head most of the time because I didn’t like my view of the surroundings obscured in any way.  The penalty for this was to swallow or half choke on a couple dozen flies per day.  Whether it was the flies or the breakdown of the satellite phone that drew the louder angrier curses from us I cannot say!

Left of the Warburton the pale, tussock sprinkled dunes of the Tirari Desert extended unbroken and undisturbed all the way to Cooper Creek.  Moving away from the banks the transition from verdant to barren is incredibly rapid.  Only along a very narrow strip either side of the waterway can the    

Pelican flocks increased in size as we approached the mouth of the Warburton.  At the mouth itself, we were greeted by a flock over one hundred strong.  Just prior to spilling into the lake, the channel had attained a width of more than a kilometre.  Even out in the middle of it, the blade of a paddle could easily touch bottom.  For the first time we had a good sense of the depth of the turbid water about us.  Here too, the epic scale of the landscape suddenly became acutely fathomable.  We could see great distances in every direction across the flat expanse of the lake.  To the west and east, the crests of faraway uplands (nothing more than higher than average sand dunes) hovered above a band of shimmering emptiness.

The Warburton Groove is a linear depression averaging two kilometres in width, which extends south into the lake for a hundred kilometres.  It inherits the Warburton Creek’s flow.  The Groove must completely fill first before water can start spreading out over the vast remainder of the lake’s area.

In the short term, finding firm solid ground on which to make camp loomed as our biggest problem.  By the evening, however, there was nothing to be done – the water in the Groove was bordered on both sides by soft mud.  Fortunately, the mud was only ankle deep at this point and apart from prompting a cautious approach to where we placed items of equipment, it didn’t cause us any real issues.  In fact, the mud made for a very comfy sleep.  Sleeping mats were used only to shield us from the moisture that seeped through the floor of the tent.

Next morning we dragged the kayaks back out into deeper water and continued.  We tracked a course down the middle of the Groove, keeping well away from the shallower edges.  The GPS showed that we were 15 metres below sea-level.  And if the knowledge that we were approaching the lowest point on the continent wasn’t enough to make the heart beat a little faster, the apparently seamless merger of water and sky guaranteed an overwhelming sense of eeriness.  As we paddled south, only the occasional gull-billed tern, head down and scanning the Groove water for a meal, could shatter the illusion of us having been swallowed up into some kind of void.

Since the mouth of the Warburton, the water depth had rarely eclipsed more than half a metre. There was some variability, but by the time we’d paddled 20 kilometres down the Groove, it had diminished to a level whereby the belly of each kayak was consistently scraping against the muddy bottom.     

At about the same time as Tim and I began discussing how prudent it would be to continue tracking the Groove, a light aircraft flew low overhead and dropped a small package.  The package contained a two-way radio, from which we learned that the now circling aircraft contained an officer of the South Australian Police, based in Oodnadatta.  In what was unmistakably a tone of concern, the officer informed us that the water dried up completely about five kilometres further south of our present position.  Although I daresay the police officer considered that he now had two ‘stranded’ kayakers to rescue, for us the news he relayed merely confirmed that the water did not deepen again further on, and vindicated the decision to head across to the edge of the Groove and initiate the trekking phase of the journey.  We thanked the officer for his concern, and made it clear that we had always been well aware that at some point we would have to stop padding and continue our journey on foot.  We made it clear to him that we were well prepared for this: we had plenty of water and food, an EPIRB, maps and a GPS, and were both fighting fit.  Above all, we insisted that in no way had our plans gone awry and we did not need any help.  

Always central to our preparations for the journey had been the fact that there was not enough water filling Lake Eyre to allow us to paddle all the way to where our support vehicle would pick us up from.  Water was restricted to the Warburton Groove and the depth of water in the Groove was always going to be an unknown.  Though some of the locals we’d spoken to suggested there would not be enough to float our kayaks at all, others, including the local scenic flight operator (who’d I’d spoken to in the days leading up to our departure) claimed that the water would be deep enough to allow us to paddle far south enough to be level with the pick-up location.  It didn’t really matter.  Even in the event of this best case scenario coming to pass, it would still be about a 20-odd kilometre trek across mud and salt crust to reach the western shore of the lake.  The performance of the equipment we’d brought with us to negotiate the mud, bull dust and salt crust between Groove and lake shore would be the same whether for a 20 kilometre trek or one five times that distance.  As it turned out, we were faced with trekking 90 kilometres to reach our goal.

Without the weight of our bodies in them, the kayaks could float in water that was only several inches deep.  We donned sled-hauling harnesses and pulled them westward at the end of a rope and carabiner.  But the water depth gradually lessened, so that by early afternoon a combination of the mud’s stickiness, suction, and the lack of foot grip made going any further with this configuration physically unsustainable.

It didn’t take us very long to realise that the trolleys we’d brought with us for the purpose of carting the kayaks overland would be completely useless.  Even had the wheels of

a fully loaded trolley been unlikely to sink up to and beyond the axle, the amount of mud sticking to each wheel after just a few rotations would render any further rotation an impossibility.

This realisation signalled the end of the line for the kayaks.  We would have to come back for them at a later date, preferably when the mud dried out.  Plan B now came into effect – Tim and I would drag a full 20 litre jerry can of drinking water behind us, which would supplement the five litres we carried in packs on our back.  In the event that they might be called upon for such a task, we had, prior to leaving Adelaide, coated the sides of two jerry cans with fibreglass.  This effectively thickened the surfaces of the container that would be in contact with the ground.  It was a countering strategy to the abrasiveness of the salt crust that undoubtedly lay up ahead.

In the weeks preceding the trip, we’d consulted widely on the nature and extent of the Lake Eyre mud.  However, neither the locals nor notable Lake Eyre explorers such as Warren Bonython were able to tell us in definitive terms what we could expect to encounter.  We therefore had to allow for the possibility that the mud might extend from the Groove more than halfway (8 km) to the lake shore, and that we might be sinking in it up to our waists.  Negotiating the mud, therefore, even without the drag created by the kayaks, had always loomed as a hugely demanding exercise.  For this too we had developed a contingency measure.  We would cross the strip of mud using snow skis.  Back in Adelaide we had screwed a simple type of cross-country binding onto each ski, bindings into which a hiking boot could be rigidly secured.  Our hope was that by spreading our weight over the length of two skis, we could reduce or even eliminate the prospect of sinking.  

Our plan for the trekking stage of the journey involved doing most of it during the coolest part of the day.  It was not yet even mid-autumn, in a region regarded as being the hottest in Australia.  The reflection of the sun off the salt crust pushed mid afternoon temperatures into the mid to high 30’s.  We set off in the early evening.  As hoped the skis significantly aided our progress over the shin deep mud.  We moved slower than was possible without the skis, but more importantly we conserved our energy.  More than the frustration and the potential for injury through slipping, walking through that mud on the edge of the Warburton Groove sucked strength from the legs.  In itself, just making preparations to leave the site where we had decided to abandon the kayaks required an immense effort.  

Shuffling forward on the skis wasn’t fast, but we managed to stay on top of the mud.  The hiking staffs we wielded in each hand helped us to haul our bodies forward.  After about a kilometre and a half the depth of the mud had lessened considerably.  Another half a kilometre and the skis began to crunch through the first visible salt crystals.  The salt crust gradually thickened and the lake sediments beneath it firmed to a point where it was possible to walk without the boot sinking down more than a centimetre or two.  We jettisoned the skis, marking their position on the GPS as we had done with the kayaks.  The moon rose orange over our left shoulders, then cast a ghostly glow across the lake’s surface.  We kept walking until 2am, before bedding down on the salt for a few well earned hours of sleep.

Much of the surface of Lake Eyre is clay pan or fine particulate bull dust.  In areas where a salt crust does exist, it is typically not as thick and as hard as that found on other large salt lakes like Lake Gardiner or Lake Torrens.  The heavy jerry cans therefore did generate a significant amount of drag.  But of course, the further we walked, the lighter each of them became.

In the late morning, a familiar looking plane flew low over our heads.  It was the Oodnadatta police once again, but onboard this time was a different officer from the one we’d spoken to the day before.  Without any sort of introduction and minus a request for information as to our status, this officer instructed us to head directly to the western shore of the lake, to coordinates where he could land the plane and pick us up.  When we asked “Why?”, the instructions were merely repeated.  For a second time then, we had to explain that everything was under control.  We again thanked the police for their concern and again stressed clearly that no help was necessary.     

Just after midday we stopped for another extended break from trekking.  We pitched the tent and for the next five hours took shelter from the sun, first inside it, then in the lengthening shadow it cast.    

Anyone who thinks that the Lake Eyre salt crust could not possibly sustain life would be very much mistaken.  

us unstuck now was a strain induced by either the repetitive walking motion or from the jarring ability of the hard unyielding salt crust.  The pair of Olang boots I wore had already risen to the task; they were sturdy, light weight and exceptional at letting my feet breathe in the hot conditions.

By mid morning of day 8, we had trekked to within a couple of kilometres of the mouth of Umbum Creek when the scenic flight pilot flew overhead as promised.   He informed us that no one had heard from our support crew since their departure from Adelaide early the previous day.  Naturally, Tim and I speculated on whether this might mean that something had happened to them en route.  And aside from our concerns for their welfare, we considered what it would mean for us if no one was there to meet us at the original pick-up point if we continued that far.  Despite still having in excess of 15 litres of water and another day's worth of food, more than enough of each to sustain us over the remaining 20 kilometres to the original pick-up point, we realised we had little choice but to accept the subsequent offer of assistance extended to us by the scenic flight pilot.  We waited at Umbum Creek for a vehicle he said he would arrange to come pick us up.  Several hours later, a Channel 7 News helicopter arrived…….

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