Finke River to Ormiston Gorge (Day 5, Sect. 10)
Rolling hills, red rock and a spectacular gorge
Ormiston Gorge, peaceful in the evening when all the tour buses have left.
Overview map
Today’s hike of 8.9km (5.5miles) with 260m/850ft elevation gain and 220m/720ft loss initially follows the Finke River and Ormiston Creek before you head northeast through hilly terrain, passing Hilltop Lookout (a different hilltop!) partway. You descend from there, weaving between more hills before a final gully leads you into Ormiston Gorge settlement. Once again the terrain is different and, if you arrive around midday, you have hot pies and sausage rolls (they run out mid-afternoon), bruschetta, scones and ice-cream!
Today you wind your way through hilly country
How to Make Today Easier
Today’s hike has no major water crossings or steep climbs or descents, but there are constant small ups and downs. If it’s forecast to be hot, simply leave early, as much of the terrain is open rather than mallee. Slower hikers should have no trouble reaching Ormiston Gorge by early or mid afternoon: it is all very doable.
Leaving Finke River Camp through spinifex and mallee. Australia’s Red Heart is called that for a reason — just look at the colour of that soil!
Down towards Ormiston Creek, near where it meets the Finke River.
Crossing Ormiston Creek. When you look at your topo map of the trail, you’ll see these wide, often dry rivers and creeks. Although most areas elsewhere are rocky, these sandy drainage lines offer good emergency sites if you are unable to reach one of the designated campsites.
Winding your way around and through hills, the trail is rarely flat despite the widely spaced lines on your topo map! Remember to glance behind you for views of Mt Sonder, growing smaller with every passing day.
Caper White Butterly (Belenois java).
Here’s another short sharp climb: expect many. Geoff calls them humpty-dos.
One of several local fan flowers, Scaevola glabrata
A distinct track, but it leads to Hilltop lookout rather than Ormiston Gorge. The line of stones (sometimes branches) is an international sign that this is NOT the main track.
You’ll find a small campsite at the end of the spur near the lookout. It is extremely exposed to wind.
Leaving the hill of Hilltop Lookout, you are about to descend…
… with the trail snaking along the connecting spines of more little hills. Much of the trail has been beautifully designed to flow with the landscape’s contours, making for enjoyable walking.
Time for second breakfast! Although some people eat on the go, we leisurely hikers prefer to stop, eat a snack, have a drink and soak up the view. We’re glad we have sitpads instead of our usual tyvek: it is so stony!
Everything on the larger scale is smoothed by millennia of weather and water in this landscape: you can see the impact of the ages. When we hiked in Iceland and New Zealand, we were amazed by the pointiness of the landscape: pointy hills like triangles, sharp valleys, harsh angles, youth.
More of that beautiful spinifex. After a while, you’ll begin to notice different species: different sizes, densities and shades of olive, green and grey.
You’ll also see many different Sennas (previously Cassia), the most common being S. artemisioides in numerous forms (fine-leafed, round-leafed, green, silver, dense, open and everything in between!). Identification is tricky when you have such a variable species, but this one caught my eye: White Cassia, S. glutinosa subsp. pruinosa.
Can you see the track winding through different spinifex species here?
Late morning and nearing Ormiston Gorge, with a confluence of creeks ahead with sandy beds and shady trees: another kilometre or so to go before Ormiston campsite.
After you climb from the creekline the terrain becomes steeper and more narrow as you approach the gorge.
Ormiston Gorge Hut, with one of several campsites far right.
Enjoying bruschettas and scones at the kiosk. If you’re following our itinerary, you will have two nights here in Ormiston Gorge. Slower hikers will arrive early to mid afternoon, with time to fuel up (the pies run out early!), but you also have time to do those chores: washing clothes, resupplying your food from your food box, and charging electronics. There are solar HOT SHOWERS west of the kiosk!
You’ll find tent sites near the hut along the drainage line, as well as closer to the gorge, but the latter have vehicle tracks either side, are busier, and feel more like car camping sites. However, they are closer to the kiosk (and showers!), so more convenient.
Charging electronics on a wall socket. Rubber bands or hair ties are handy, as are double adaptors for the more popular plugs on the pillars under the verandah. You’ll also find a plug in the amphitheatre west of the kiosk. (We had the charging gear in our resupply box).
Resupply with food, fuel and maps for the next section, plus laundry detergent, body wash and shampoo for the hot showers here. I hadn’t been sure which boots to wear: the cooler model with a thinner stone plate, or the WP model: hotter, sweatier but with a thicker stone plate. I packed the heavier boots into this first box but the lighter ones turned out to be fine.
If you’re collecting your own boxes after the hike, and you have things in your pack that you now realise you won’t need on the remainder of the trail, you can put them into this first resupply box: we put in almost all our tent stakes.
These beautiful little Spinifex Pigeons (Geophaps plumifera) with their bright barred plumage dart about under chairs scavenging for crumbs. They nest on the ground, amongst rocks and, yes, spinifex tussocks. If you hike very early in the morning or at night, they’ll flush from the track in a great whirring and clapping of wings.
Cook dinner in the hut and then, if you like, walk down to the gorge to eat on the water’s edge. Many of the gorges light up spectacularly at midday and early afternoon, and the convoys of tourist buses arrive to coincide, but it all quietens down late afternoon: Larapinta hikers have the gorge mostly to themselves.
Peaceful evening light in Ormiston Gorge at the end of another grand day.
If you’re following our itinerary suggestions, tomorrow you’ll hike the Pound Circuit walk, when you’ll emerge from the far end of this pool after seeing new areas and walking the entire length of the gorge: something to look forward to!
We respectfully acknowledge the Arrernte People as the traditional custodians of the land on which we walk and pay our respects to Elders past and present and to the Aboriginal people present today.
