Burra Trail Rides: at Burra in South Australia's Mid North Region

In a dusty stockyard in the back blocks near Burra Graham Radford gives another novice a quick lesson.

"Just pull pull pull like that. It's like a bike, you just let one side go and you just pull the other side...and when you want to stop just pull on the rope and say whoa!"

It's a lesson I hope my mount Patch has taken on board. He's a pure quarter horse with, I'm told, a peaceful disposition as have all the horses on Graham's Burra Trail Rides. It's a venture he started eight years ago aimed at introducing people to a leisurely way of experiencing his country.

"Morgan is eighty kilometres from Burra. That's straight through here where the River Murray is and that's all pastoral country out there. Goyers line goes through there, which is the demarcation line supposedly between farming and grazing country."

There are probably times when motorists on the way to the Riverland do a bit of a doubletake - as what looks like the cast from Oklahoma take to the Burra Hills. But all this is Graham's way of ensuring the novice can take a break especially if they saddle up for one of his three day adventures.

"Some of the people get a little sore on the bottom so they have an alternate riding on the wagon. They just tie their horse on the back"

"So that's for me if I can't make it through today ?"

"There's always the option to opt out"

"Yes...over the year's we've found that a lot of people don't want to ride the whole time so it's very pleasant just sitting on there, so we have nibbles and afternoon tea on the wagon."

As the day rolls on and the cut cereal paddocks give way to more rolling hills and more paddocks you find yourself slipping away - back to the days when the first settlers moved into the area. That is until Graham picks up on some faulty technique and you're brought back to reality.

"Better just shorten your reins a bit there Annie. Annie shorten your rains a bit. Just pull back behind Lisa."

Out on the bald hills near Burra... space is never an issue for city slickers trying to escape rat race.

With the sun on the stubble.... it's not hard to see why that famous South Australian author Colin Thiele fell in love with country like this - although a tree or two might add just a little to the vista. But Graham points out the hills around Burra were always pretty much as they are today despite claims that all of this was cleared for the nearby mines.

"Most people ask me if it was cleared. I've had Botanists out here and they said there was never many trees. There were just a few sheoks through the tops of the hills. It was a bit like the moors in England where its just barren hills and a lack of numbers of trees."

Room enough to lose yourself in your own pioneering fantasy out on the trail on one of Graham Radford's Burra Trail Rides. To book contact (08) 8892 2627. If you have any further questions please email info@postcards.sa.com.au