Farina Ghost Town and Lyndhurst Ochre Cliffs | Oodnadatta Track | Gekko Safari

The drive north from the Flinders Ranges to Marree isn’t empty road. It follows the route of the old Ghan railway, and the landscape is full of reminders of what used to be here.

Lyndhurst has ochre cliffs, with bands of red, yellow and white in the rock. Aboriginal people have used ochre from this area for a very long time, for ceremony and trade. A bit further on is Farina, a former railway town. At one time it had a population, a bakery and a busy station. Today most of it is ruins, and standing among the stone walls on an empty plain tells you a lot about how fragile settlement is out here.

What to look for

• The colours in the ochre cliffs, which change through the day
• Stone ruins at Farina and what’s left of the town layout
• The old railway line, which you can follow for much of the route
• The scale of the country, which gets bigger the further north you go

These stops are short, but they set up the whole trip. By the time you reach Marree you’ve already seen what the outback does to places that people have tried to hold onto.