Di and Daves Tagalong tours: Day 11 Jarvis Lookout and 5 Ways

This morning we had our first real look around Hawker when everything was open. We all went to the general store, had coffee, brought a few trinkets then meandered around a couple of streets to get our bearings. We decided to purchase a self guided tour of Hawker for the princely sum of $2.50 which we have decided to do tomorrow while the car is being fixed. Next stop was the “I” centre (information centre) to check out a couple of 4by tours and also a couple of other spots we wanted to check out. This was on the recommendation of the dweller of the art gallery. We haven’t done the artist studio yet but its on the list as we believe the panoramic painting of the Flinders Ranges is fantastic. We did however meet the resident who habituated at the gallery, an incredible bubbly person. I don’t know what she was breathing but I want some and she was very helpful to boot. As was the lady at the “I” centre which Gaz and I had headed for while the girls ordered coffee. They also were pretty helpful only problem we encountered here was the lady helping us didn’t have an on/off switch so by the time we extracted ourselves, politely, our coffee was nearly the iced variety.

With our booty in hand we headed back to the van for a powwow to decide what we would do. The six of us decided we would head for Javis lookout then from there to a place called 5 ways.

Jarvis lookout looking east

Jarvis lookout is about 6kms west of town on a relatively easy stretch of dirt into private property. The owners have allowed tourist’s access at no charge in conjunction with the local council.. From the car park its is about 250 mtr assent, along a very difficult, steep and rocky track. The trip and the destination offer some fantastic views back along the plain into Hawker and west into the ranges. From the summit we decided that we would take the easier path back (so the sign said). Now the path up was not all that well marked but was a 4 lane highway compared to the return, which after descending about 100 mtrs we were llost completely. So we became mountain goats and forged our own path across the slope until we came to the original track. Robyn and Peter elected to come back the way they went up and nearly beat us to the car park having started their decent 10 min after us.

Cairn at lookout

From there we headed back out on the Tenant Creek road to a place called 5 ways( because 5 roads meet). They are all dirt and the area was supposed to have some very interesting scenery where creeks had gouged huge tracks through the country side. It was a real good drive and again presented us with a different perspective on the land and life in these parts. The group shot was taken at 5 ways the dray in the back ground was just sitting in the scrub. We also came across a cemetery in the middle of nowhere with a few headstones in it. On reflection, looking at the head stones and the country, we have it pretty easy. A number of the graves contained children of varying ages but all were very young.