OUTBACK STORY
Rapt in the Ranges
Shaped by titanic natural forces - and ancestral creation figures - Wilpena Pound is the scenic heart of Flinders Range National Park.
Story and photos Michael Gebicki
or anyone who prefers their outback scenery wild, majestic and steep, the
central Flinders Ranges are in a class apart. Here, surrounded by the arid
wasteland of South Australia's great salt lakes, are ancient, tortured hills
that have inspired some of our greatest landscape artists. At the centre of
this landscape is Wilpena Pound, an 80-square kilometre bowl ringed by quartzite
hills that rise gently and then fall away in sheer cliffs on the outside. Lapping
against Wilpena's immense, rust-coloured flanks is a rippling sea of undulating
hills covered with callitris pines and guttered by creeks lined with river
red gums. Wedge-tailed eagles drift in the air currents, and in the mornings
the hills are alive with western grey kangaroos. The colours come straight
from the furnace: ochre, livid purple and charcoal, culminating in the fierce
heat of dusk when the dying sun sets fire to the ridgetops.
Full story Issue 31 Oct/Nov 2003
