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The 400-mile-long (645 km) Oodnadatta Track is a dirt road between Marree and Oodnadatta in the state of South Australia. It crosses the Tirari Desert, skirts Lake Eyre National Park and winds past desert sand ridges, gibber plains and artesian mound springs. The track closely follows the original Overland Telegraph Line and the Ghan Railway, which created a communication route through this part of central Australia in the late 1800s.
The line and railway have both been long dismantled, although it is still possible to see the odd pole, insulator cap, sleeper and rail peg. The angle pole pictured here was once used to transmit messages along the telegraph line.
The track was originally used by Aboriginal people as part of a major trade route that linked the region of Kimberley in Western Australia and Australia’s northernmost point, Cape York, to the south coast, cutting through central Australia. While this is the continent’s driest area, the Oodnadatta Track has a series of springs feeding water from the Great Artesian Basin. For the Aborigines and, later, the explorers and settler, these freshwater springs were used as stepping stones to travel through the arid interior. |
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