Woken by departing grey nomads as usual. Guys and girls, you are retired, no need to race out of this campground only to arrive early afternoon at another, nearly identical campground.

Out of the campground about 9:30 am, found the Finke Road and quickly left the bitumen behind. For the first kilometre or so followed wheel tracks that turned out to be someone pushing a baby carriage, probably from the Kulgera Station homestead.

Over the Adelaide-Darwin railway 10 km east of the roadhouse. The road started off well but progressively deteriorated into corrugated/sandy red dirt with sections of good surface.

I was just getting in to the swing of it, enjoying a section of fair road surface (firm, no corrugations, no loose sand, gentle rises, pretty valleys and mesas) when there was another ‘plunk’ as yet another drive side spoke on the rear wheel broke.

It is a lonely feeling replacing the fifth busted spoke on the same wheel when heading out to the Simpson Desert western edge and not knowing why the spokes are breaking.

Anyway, replaced the spoke while pondering how far I was from a bike shop.

Got almost to the Antares Bore and camped in a gravel pit listening to the bulls challenging each other in the adjoining paddocks. Had my first campfire to save methylated spirits (alcohol) fuel for my stove for wet days and mornings. Alcohol fuel is not stocked by roadhouses or shops in central Australia because people drink it.

Note: I was using HEMA printed maps and the Australian Geological Survey free vector maps (dated 2001) and both are badly out of date in 2016 – roads have moved, bores have closed down (Antares is shut) as stockroutes are not maintained and cattle stations switch to central bores with pipelines to troughs up to tens of kilometres away.