Another great campsite with a great view.

Real wild Sturt's Desert Peas today.

Tomorrow we should be in Laverton and the end of the Great Central Road. Need to get rid of the last of the fresh fruit and veggies.

It has been a great drive. I think we have come the right way by travelling East to West as you do the rough bits first.

This route is being promoted as the Outback Way - Australia's Longest Short Cut. It is already looking tired and dated. Some of the signage needs replacing. Some of the signage at scenic points of interest is non existent. The mounting posts are there but I suspect the signs never made it. Places like the Warburton Art Gallery would have been a real point of interest for us. I won't let the facts spoil a good story but it really looks like a classic example of "happy to take the funding to set up, but no commitment to keep it going".  Could possibly go as far as say the locals don't really want tourists out here.

Managed to find this rock hole. I hope that cyclist is not counting on getting water here. If there is any water under that dead camel it will be pretty foul.

The whole Great Central Road is littered with car bodies, usually on their roof with no wheels. While this Ford is not directly on the main road - it is on a track into one of the Gnamma holes. It is also one of the few that hasn't been burnt.

"Clifford" in the moon light.

Laverton as the start or end of the Great Central Road was a little disappointing - smaller than I expected. It did have a great dump point, with potable water though.

Leonora - Gwalia was much more interesting, although the grocery shopping was still uninspiring.

Still an active gold mining area this is the open cut pit next to the Gwalia Museum.

The now defunct underground mine had an inclined shaft, at about 45 degrees, roughly following the gold seam down. This is the winder room with the piston steam engines used to haul both men and ore up and down.

At one stage Herbert Hoover was the mine manager - he went on to become Amercia's President Hoover.

Stumbled across this board in one of the museum sheds. I mustn't be as old as I think I am as I have never seen a synchronising board that looks like this. Perhaps some of the operators from Callide A have used something similar.

There is a whole partially restored town of corrugated iron shanties surrounding the mine

I think this piano might need a tune.

Garage.

The State Hotel was owned and built by the State Government.

Lake Ballard is a salt lake about 50km from Menzies. This is the first time I have walked on a dry salt lake. Well this one wasn't completely dry. I could feel the underlying mud squelch as I walked on the salt.

This lake is the location of an art installation titled "Inside Australia"

This installation consists of about 30 of these statues place on the lake bed. The statues have been made after body scanning residents of Menzies. The statues are so unlike a human body I am not sure why he bothered with body scans. They are about 3/4 life size and are placed at distances of 2 to 3 hundred metres.

We were both underwhelmed when we first got to the lake. As we camped there the night and I walked out and photographed a few of the statues, I have to confess that I warmed a bit to the installation. Still don't think it is some kind of master piece however.

Inside Australia - art installation.

We drove the short 20km Heritage Trail around Sandstone. "London Bridge" is a sandstone archway.

Not far away is a cave that was carved out of the sandstone as cool storage for the beer from the brewery built on the cliff top above it. Looks like in the middle of nowhere now. I guess things were different when there were a lot of thirsty miners in the area.

The road took us straight past an old government stamp battery - used for crushing gold ore. The actually battery was in operation until the 1980's. You could see that it had adapted to be driven by an electric motor.

There are still a couple of office/accommodation buildings standing.