Flinders Range

If you’ve ever dreamed of living like a local in the Outback, station stays are the most relaxing way to do it. Sheep and cattle stations have been the mainstay of South Australia’s Outback for 150 years. Now they’re becoming welcoming havens for tourists.

You can see great landscapes and encounter a distinctive way of life by driving through their front gates. Not long ago pastoralists welcomed just the occasional weary stranger…

Today they want you to stay with them and share their love of their place.

You don’t need a 4WD to have fun exploring the secrets of the region. But if you do, lock those hubs and lock onto some serious fun!serious fun! Take the roads less travelled by the general public and you’ll be exploring numerous stations who’ve opened up their properties for four-wheel drivers and campers where you can test your skills on a range of tracks for all abilities.

The Flinders Ranges & Outback is one of Australia’s richest areas of Aboriginal heritage and living culture. The Flinders Ranges & Outback covers such a vast area of South Australia, and so many different environments, it’s no surprise that it is one of Australia’s richest areas of Aboriginal heritage and living culture. The natural features of the Flinders Ranges are still of strong personal significance to the Adnyamathanha people and the geology, topography, flora, fauna and climate all feature in traditional stories and legends.

Enjoy excellent opportunities to observe wildlife in their natural surrounds in the national parks of the Flinders and Outback. Visit Flinders Ranges National Park and you’ll almost certainly see Euros, Red Kangaroos or Western Grey Kangaroos grazing peacefully on grasslands or bounding across the plains. As the sun goes down, you may even catch a glimpse of the rare Yellow-footed Rock-wallaby around the rocky outcrops of Brachina Gorge.

Recognised as one of Australia’s iconic National Landscapes, the 400km Flinders Ranges is South Australia’s longest chain of mountains. To see the magic of the ranges at their best, don’t miss a fabulous Flinders sunrise or sunset.

Great sunset spots include Razorback Lookout, Bunyeroo Valley Lookout or Stokes Hill Lookout where the last rays of sunlight often tint the mountains in hues of golden-orange, red or indigo-blue.

For many visitors, the jewel of the Flinders is Wilpena Pound. Shaped like a giant crater, this geological marvel measuring 17km in length and 8km wide, is actually the remnant valley floor from an ancient mountain range that has been eroding away over 600 million years.

In Mount Remarkable National Park, don’t miss the dramatic red quartzite cliffs of Alligator Gorge and the Narrows. The Outback also offers many memorable landscapes. From the endless red sand dunes of the Simpson Desert stretching beyond the horizon to the glistening white saltpans of Lake Eyre, and wilderness wetlands of Coongie Lakes.

Whether you’re a camp-oven cook or lover of gourmet, the region boasts a good range of cafes, restaurants and bakeries offering good food and service. Many don’t know, but South Australia’s wine-making and grape-growing tradition continues north of Clare Valley and into the southern Flinders Ranges to Wirrabara and Melrose.

Bundaleer Sparkling Shiraz has won many awards and is a national favourite. You can purchase it from the North Star cellar door in Melrose. The Flinders Ranges also has many ‘new world’ olive groves, all producing high quality and flavour packed Extra Virgin Olive Oils. You can purchase locally grown olive oils from the districts producers markets or from specialised olive oil outlets such as Hickory’s Run.

Laura is home to Golden North ice-cream, a South Australian owned company who do a range of weird and wonderful flavours. Outback tucker is hearty fare and well-worth the stop especially if teamed up with a cold beer or two. Producers Markets are proving to be quite popular around the region… so why not indulge and stock up with regional produce.

If you’re looking for something completely different, an experience you can’t get in a city, at a beach or at home, Coober Pedy is one place you must see before you die. Where else in the world do residents live underground?

Where else in the hot Australian desert do the temperatures stay constant, and where else can you ‘noodle’ for exquisitely coloured opal? Watch out! Opal-fever might catch you in this laid-back, quirky outback town.

The people of Coober Pedy are as colourful as the opals that made the town famous. Ask any local about legendary opal finds and eyes will twinkle and the stories will flow. Half the residents live underground to escape hot temperatures in summer and stay cosy through winter.

(Underground houses remain a constant 24 degrees year long.) So only in Coober Pedy will you find underground churches, art galleries and a golf course without a blade of grass.