Eyre thought that there a horseshoe of salt lakes from Lake Torrens in the west to Lake Blanche in the east around the Flinders Ranges that blocked his way. His 1840 expedition was to try to find a way around the horseshoe.

These were the last trees as we made our way across the saltbush country to Mt Hopeless on the last morning of the camel trek. They stood out.

After leaving dusty, saltbush plain we entered and walked across a gibber plain. I had never seen this kind of land before. It was stark and bare with minimal vegetation as we were way north of Goyder’s line of rainfall. I thought who in their right mind would try to run sheep or cattle here. This was drought country. It meant ruin for the pastoralists. How could people think that this kind of country would enable South Australia to become an agricultural paradise?

There was a sense of entering and standing on the edge of a vast space that stretched north, east and west. In the north west is the Tirari Desert; to the north east is the Sturt Stony Desert; whilst in the north is the Strzelecki Desert then the Simpson Desert.

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