Corridors Through Time Tour - The Flinders Ranges: In the Outback region of South Australia
Inside the Wilpena Pound Resort holiday-makers fuel up for another big day and the old photos are proof that this place has always been a magnet for people wanting to experience a special part of the Australian continent - and one of the oldest.
From the days of the Bonds Tours of the fifties and long before, tourists have set off from the Chalet for a trip through time. In a matter of minutes our tour bus is framed by an ancient landscape. At Stokes Hill Lookout we stop to get our bearings and for Elsie Morrison of Mildura, this is a pilgrimage of sorts. She was reminiscing about the first time she saw this place with her late husband… almost 30 years ago.
For Elsie its a significant part of her life but in the chronology of the Flinders it's a nano-second - a blink of the eye in a story that extends back 850 million years to when this was part of an inland sea. Layers of sediment were formed and hardened over time until monstrous tectonic forces - pushing from different directions caused a massive buckling of the earth.
“It's the remains of a huge series of domes and that's why it looks like an untidy book case from the air.” According to our tour guide, Richard Wickens. He uses the analogy of pushing carpet together so it creates a series of waves.
“That's part of what's happened and then it's all been eroded away over five hundred million years.”
According to geologists one of the most significant events in the history of life on earth is recorded in the thin layers of sedimentary rocks scattered throughout the majestic ramparts of the Flinders Ranges. Fossils known as Ediacra Fauna provide the first evidence of living organisms with multiple cells on the planet.
We’re back in the 4WD and begin our journey back in time through Brachina Gorge also known as the Corridor Through Time.
The lessons continue at our first stop with the interpretive signs highlighting Ediacra Fuana or jellyfish preserved in rock 550 million years ago. Further into the gorge we come across more signs of life. But according to Richard, they are a little less complex but significantly older.
“This is the stromatolite - basically the remains of a colony of blue green algae. These colonies are about three point five billion years ago. So they're pretty ancient. This particular one is right about six hundred million years old.”
Each layer of sediment is an ancient layer of algae, which is crucial to the story of life on earth because they were the first organisms to give off oxygen.
As you look around you wonder just what else is contained in the surrounding rocks. Richard agrees - “I feel that you really can believe that we are one of the oldest countries in the world here. It's an ancient looking landscape. It’s almost primitive. You can almost imagine some of these dinosaurs and fossily things getting around here.”
It’s a landscape shaped by water millions of years ago - and water is still the life force.
“Now that's the reason that we have colonies of Yellow Footed Rock Wallabies in Brachina Gorge. Because they're very keen on a regular proper drink of water.”
It's spectacular country that was once traveled by the bullock teams bringing copper from the Blinman Mine in the northern Flinders. Now it's traveled by tourists who marvel at the opportunity to travel back in time.
The Corridors Through Time Tour leaves the Wilpena Resort daily. For more info please email info@postcards-sa.com.au
Corridors Through Time Tour
Wilpena Pound Resort
Phone: 8648 0004
