The Murray – Sunset National Park – More Pink Lakes – Day 308

The area known as Pink Lakes, within the 6,330 square kms Murray – Sunset National Park, consists of four lakes – Crosbie, Becking, Kenyon and Hardy. Yesterday we went on a walk which covered Lakes Crosbie and Kenyon. Today we will, through a combination of driving and walking, explore Lakes Becking and Hardy.

As we didn’t arise at an ungodly hour (anything before 9am !) we delayed our exploration till mid afternoon. Pink Lakes always look better early morning or later in the afternoon. In addition an afternoon visit would also provide optimal lighting conditions for photography.

You may recall that we settled for a totally adequate though suboptimal site for our van when we arrived here yesterday. As we were finishing breakfast one of the sites that we would have preferred became free. We quickly prepared our caravan for the short move and grabbed the vacated site before anyone else came in. Now we had the van perpendicular to Lake Crosbie.

Always time for morning tea and a biscuit

On completion of my mid morning cup of tea and being suitably rested I took a short stroll down to the lakeside (Crosbie) where I particularly enjoyed the cloud refections on the peaceful lake and managed to get a semi-decent photo of a parrot lurking in a tree set amidst the low lying saltbush.

Lake Crosbie – pink lake reflections

Salt Bush on the shore of Lake Crosbie. It is amazing how anything grows in such salty conditions. Salt Lakes can be 10 times or more salty than the earth’s oceans.

Morning constitutional (by which I mean my short walk!) over it was time for lunch, after which I spent a bit of time reading and blog writing, taking advantage of quite a good internet connection for such a remote area.

In the mid-afternoon, we unhooked the van from the car and headed north to Lake Becking. We parked in the small campsite/day-use area, sheltered from the lake by a sand dune. From here, I walked in a northerly direction, slightly inland from the lake, taking the Lake Becking Nature track which, in part, follows an abandoned tramway used to haul salt from the lake until 1979 when the area became a State Park. For more details on salt recovery from the Pink Lakes, see my previous entry.

Lake Becking from the top of the sand dune which shelters the small campsite/day use area

Lake Becking Nature Walk

An abandoned tram wagon chassis – formerly used to haul salt from the lake

On the shore of Lake Becking

Trees lain by salt miners decades ago to assist in the movement of salt from the lake

And a few drone shots which much better capture the ‘pinkness’ of the lake from above.

With a distant view of Lake Crosbie……..

En route to Lake Harding we pulled into a viewing area at the northern end of Lake Crosbie. Alas, a bit of wind had picked up so we (novices) didn’t fly the drone here but I did capture a few shots with my camera one of which I include here.

Lake Crosbie from its northern shore

After a short stop here we moved on to the last of the four main pink lakes, Lake Harding. Lake Harding is the smallest of the four main lakes and is billed as the most colourful. With a circumference of only 1.7 kms I decided to walk around it – an easy and very pleasant trek.

Lake Harding

And a shot from the drone, in addition to my main picture at the head of this entry which is also of Lake Hardy.

By this stage it was starting to get cold so, sighseeing finished for another day, we headed back to the caravan and cranked up the heater.

To finish up this entry I will leave you with a shot of tonight’s sunset in the Murray – Sunset National Park…. not bad given the high level of cloud cover.

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The next review from my Adelaide to Canberra road trip can be found HERE.

Should you wish to follow this road trip from the beginning please start HERE.

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