Winter in the outback
Winter and spring provide the best conditions for an outback trip. Expect mild, clear days and chilly nights, which are perfect for warming your hands beside a campfire.
The twisted and folded landscape of the ancient Flinders Ranges offers spectacular scenery. Iconic Wilpena Pound is like a colossal amphitheatre pressed into the earth, and a scenic flight will reveal the massive tectonic forces that formed this remarkable landscape.
Watch our video below, which captures some of the sights you can experience on your outback adventure, then read on to find out more about winter in the outback.
The northern Flinders Ranges is a remote mountain wilderness – a place of towering escarpments and deep gorges. Keen offroaders in sturdy four-wheel-drives can head off on the many challenging tracks that criss-cross the region, or take a tour and let someone else do the driving.
Further north, the mostly unsealed Oodnadatta Track follows a line of freshwater springs that proved vital when the Overland Telegraph and the original route of The Ghan railway were being established.
At Wabma Kadarbu, warm water gurgles up from mound springs that rise above a vast treeless plain. Visitors at the nearby Coward Springs Campground can melt away the outback chill in a natural outdoor spa, set among historic date palms.
Intrepid travellers, fully prepared for a remote outback journey, can head to Dalhousie Springs on the edge of the Simpson Desert. Hidden behind tea-trees, bullrushes and reeds, you’ll find a classic oasis.
The waters reach the surface at the temperature of a warm bath, and there’s no greater thrill than easing into the main spring on a cold desert night. Keep an eye out for the Dalhousie hardyhead, an endemic species of fish that somehow survives the spring’s hot, brackish waters.