Breaking News

June 28, 2008:

Arkaroola as You've Never Seen it Before!

A stereoscopic 3D presentation about Arkaroola and the Flinders Ranges is showing in Adelaide next week.

3D movies have been tried before, typically with less than spectacular results, but these digital pictures are astounding. From close-ups of bugs and lizards poking their heads out of the screen, to awesome aerial landscapes in their sculpted detail. Words can't describe it.

Tim Baier is a visual effects artist with feature film credits including Lord of the Rings, Batman Begins, and King Kong. Three years ago Tim turned his efforts towards accommodating our two eyes and bringing about a realism on the screen not seen before - see behind the scenes on Tim's web site: http://www.stereovfx.com

With a mobile 'movie studio' and aircraft in tow, Tim ended up at Arkaroola for over a year as he worked on his show, which has been amazing guests here at the village every time he holds a screening.  Indeed it is a show reel of what the Australian film industry could have a head start in.

This may only be the only public viewing, Tim is installing his own silver screen and projectors in the cinema!

Please feel free to get back to me if you need more information. Showdates and times are listed below:

"Standing in Amazement"
4 nights Thursday 3rd - Sunday 6th July
7pm and 8.30pm sessions
IRIS Cinema, 13 Morphett St Adelaide
$15 / $12 concession
Seating is limited to 35 -  pre-booking is recommended.
To advance purchase call 08 8410 0979 between 9:30-5:00 Mon-Fri.
  

June 13, 2008:

Yes, it Does Rain at Arkaroola!

A total of 39mm of good, steady soaking rain has fallen on Arkaroola during the past week (since 5 June).

Marg Sprigg reports that while this amount of rain is great for the country, it really is at the wrong time of the year to be of lasting benefit;  however, having soaked into the ground without causing any creeks to flood will be of benefit to flora and did replenish Arkaroola's nearly depleted rainwater tanks. 

At this normally cool time of the year trees and shrubs have generally slowed their growth for winter but the greatly reduced evaporation is quite beneficial.  Coupled with our unseasonablly warm weather, this recent rainfall is likely to encourage regrowth.

We'll keep you posted though on further developments as they occur.   

April 17, 2008:

Latest From the ARK Newsletter now available

Marg and Doug Sprigg are pleased to advised that Arkaroola's latest E-newsletter, From the ARK, Summer Edition 2008, is now available for uploading by clicking here  (1.5MB)

Past editions can also be downloaded - please move further down this page for details.
 

February 14, 2008 - Media Release: 

Arkaroola Seeks Total Mining Ban in Wilderness Sanctuary 

The owners of Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary have written to South Australian Premier Mike Rann seeking a total ban on mining activity on the property.

The SA government has ordered that Marathon's uranium exploration activities at Mt Gee, deep in Arkaroola's hearland, be "suspended indefinitely".

This followed an investigation sought by the Rann Government that concluded that the company had wrongly disposed of 22,800 bags of drilling and other waste at the envioronmentally sensitive site.  Some of these bags were found to contain low-level radioactive material...

To read the full Media Relase, please click here for a PDF version (160 KB)

November 4, 2007:

We've Done it Again! 
Winner of Multiple S.A. Tourism Awards - 2007:  

It is with great pride and pleasure that we announce our amazing success at the SA Tourism Awards, held on 3 November, 2007. 

Doug_Kristin_07_Awards.jpg

With our third consecutive win for Ecotourism, Akaroola now enters the Hall of Fame for that prestigious category.  Our wins on the night incude:

It is also the second consecutive year that we have won Sustainable Tourism, and we've been awarded Major Tourist Attraction for two years out of the past three.

Further information about these prestigious awards can be found by clicking here.

Of course these awards would not be possible without the South Australian Tourism Commission (SATC) and their sponsors, and the SA Tourism Industry as a whole.  Our hearty congratulations to other category winners, and a heartfelt thank you to all who submitted entries - without you all there would be no Awards.

Our sincere thanks also go to our wonderful staff, without whom Arkaroola could not exist. Please click here to see our official Media Release regarding our success.

Marg and Doug Sprigg
4 November 2007

  

October 6, 2007:  

Arkaroola Wildernesss Sanctuary Under Threat from Uranium Mining!

Please click here for further information and what you can do to help protect Arkaroola from a uranium mine proposed by Marathon Resouces P/L at Mount Gee, in the heartland of our wildenerness sanctuary.

Additional information is also contained in Arkaroola's latest e-newsletter, From the ARK, issue No. 7, October 2007.  See further below for a download (or click here to download this file - 1.4MB)



February 2, 2007:  

Successful Star Party DownUnder 2007:

We are pleased to announce the successful conclusion of Star Party DownUnder in January 2007.  This annual event will continue again in January 2008 - please click here for further information.  

Arkaroola Newsletter From the ARK-Spring 2007 (7th) Edition now Available:

The seventh edition (Spring 2007) of From the Ark, our official seasonal newsletter covering events, newsworthy and interesting articles about Arkaroola is now available for downloading from this location by clicking here (1400 KB) - as with previous editions, its a must read! 

Alternatively, it is also available via email, by adding your name to our mailing list at marketing@arkaroola.com.au - please include 'Newsletter Request' in the subject line. 

Similarly, if some of our regular readers are no longer receiving the newsletter, note that we've had some problems with our email server, so please send an email to marketing@arkaroola.com.au and we will ensure your address is added to our mailing list.

Please Note:  If you decide to print the newsletter, set your printer settings to print in grey-scale to save your colour ink.

Previous editions are also available by clicking the links below:
First Edition - Winter 05 (about 695 KB)
Second Edition - Spring 05 (about 926 KB)
Third Edition - Summer 05/06 (912 KB)
Fourth Edition - Autumn 06 (695 KB)
Fifth Edition - Winter 06 (800 KB)
Sixth Editon - Spring/Summer 06 (1.3MB)
Seventh Edition - Spring 2007 (1.4MB)

 

  

Media Releases - As Others See Us:

The following has been cut and pasted (with permission) from The TimesOnline and is an article by Ian Belcher and printed on 1 October 2005.

The Times can be viewed at http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/

Article Head

 

The TimesOctober 01, 2005


All-star tour to Australia


Ian Belcher opens our special report on journeys Down Under with a voyage to the far galaxies

Picture
Ian Belcher and his partner Michelle Puttick near the Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary in the Flinders Range, South Australia

DOUG SPRIGG is one of astronomy’s more unusual stars. Fusing the knowledge of Patrick Moore with the style of the Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin, he offers entertaining tours of the night sky from a remote hill-top observatory in South Australia.

Peering through a telescope the width of a large battleship gun barrel, he is struggling to locate the Silver Dollar, a spiral galaxy 10,000,000 light years away. “Bugger,” he sighs. “Someone’s nicked it. No, hold on, there it is. Very faint.” It’s a style you’re unlikely to hear at the Royal Astronomical Society, but over 90 minutes Sprigg manages to demystify some of the secrets of deep space as we search for distant galaxies and dense star clusters.

“For the past 70 years we have been sending radio and TV signals into outer space,” he says, providing perspective on the mind-boggling scale of the universe. “In 10 million years’ time, they will reach someone in a distant galaxy, and Neighbours and Pop Idol will be proof of intelligent life on earth. I doubt they’ll reply.”

A nice light touch perhaps, but it shouldn’t detract from the fact that the Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary in the Flinders Ranges is one of the best places in the southern hemisphere to gaze at the heavens. The Australian National University in Canberra has scrutinised climate reports for the past decade, revealing that the observatory has up to 300 clear nights a year, along with the most stable air (temperature fluctuations can distort the image).

The nearest town, Leigh Creek, is 100km (60 miles) away — and that’s only 300 people and two dogs — so there is virtually zero light pollution. Looking up, I don’t just see a blanket of stars, I see a dazzling duvet.

But visitors don’t go to Arkaroola, with its comfortable motel, restaurant, stores and camping ground, purely to look up. They also spend a lot of time looking down. Beneath their feet is one of Australia’s most ancient, interesting and bizarre landscapes. Its 600 rugged square kilometres (230 square miles) cover the north-east horn of the Flinders Ranges, where the mountains’ ordered ridges mutate into serrated rows of granite peaks, bulbous domes, huge lumps of black basalt and spectacular white pinnacles. There are multicoloured accumulations of crystals, including cliff faces of green malachite, and old mine workings testifying to the presence of industrial rubies and sapphires, along with gold, silver, copper and uranium.

And there are more astounding statistics. The red and white granite in the heart of the sanctuary around Mount Painter is 1.6 billion years old, while the surrounding sedimentary rocks are roughly half that age.

The landscape leaps to life on the resort’s 4WD Ridgetop Tour along old mining exploration tracks. Sprigg’s commentary fuses high academia with light entertainment. He litters his description with references to the Proterozoic, Palaeozoic and Jurassic periods, but also includes the story of the American surveyor who worked alone on isolated Mount McKinley in the 1960s. When contact was lost, a rescue team trekked to the peak, where they found him gibbering and performing naked cartwheels.

For all the science, it is the Aboriginal explanation of the topography that lingers in the mind. A large serpent, having drunk the contents of Lake Frome, slithered through the rocks, scouring out cliffs, gorges and valleys. Wherever people tried to stop him there are now evocatively named water sources, including Bollabollana (Run Run) spring and Nooldoonooldoona (Place of Falling Rocks) waterhole — both guaranteed to provoke lame Dame Edna impersonations.

As Sprigg skilfully navigates the steep bumpy track, he continually points out features, including the Armchair, a massive swollen granite intrusion that he reckons “looks more like a beanbag”; the encrusted quartz crystals on Mount Gee resembling strands of frost in the 40C (104F) heat; and Paralana hot springs, where there were doomed attempts to found a health spa in the 1920s. With a merciless landscape and severe shortages of lemongrass scented towels, it was never going to be a Banyan Tree.

Indeed, the whole area is peppered with the remains of doomed attempts at commercial exploitation: ruined Cornish copper smelters at Yudnamutana; the workings at Radium Ridge, last explored during the Second World War in a frenzied bid to find raw material for an atom bomb; and Lively’s Find, which produced several pounds of gold in the 1950s.

The tour, one of several 4WD trips offered by the resort, along with bushwalking and scenic flying trips to surrounding attractions such as Coober Pedy, ends with a nerve-shredding drive to Sillers Lookout — a gradient it appears impossible to conquer in a vehicle.

Once there you are reduced to silent contemplation by the epic 360-degree panorama. Ahead is a vast plain, punctuated by the 5,300km Dog Fence — the longest man-made structure on earth — that keeps dingoes out of southern sheep country.

You can also look towards the outline of Mount Painter. Its now-defunct hot springs are being studied by Nasa to hone search tactics for life on Mars — a fitting finale to a destination that so memorably links heaven and earth.

Need to know

Ian Belcher travelled with Qantas (0845 7477767, www.qantas.co.uk), which flies from Heathrow to Adelaide from £910.80. Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary (00 61 8 8648 4848, www.arkaroola.com.au) has rooms from £29 a night. The resort can be reached by car or plane pick-ups outside the Prairie Inn at Parachilna for £143 return (up to four people).

Further information: www.australia.com. For a free Travellers Guide call 0906 8633235 (premium rate).

Copyright 2006 Times Newspapers Ltd.

Armchair Ridgetop

The Armchair
near Ridgetop track

Lake Frome

Lake Frome - one of many small islands

Sillers Lookout

Sillers Lookout with Freeling Heights in Background