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| Birthday Waterhole |
https://nt.gov.au/parks/find-a-park/tjoritja-west-macdonnell-national-park/larapinta-trail
Brinkley Bluff was, as advertised, a very exposed site. It was very cold – I had on two merino thermal tops, two merino thermal tights, down jacket, merino beanie and socks and was zipped and draw stringed inside my -9 down sleeping bag with thermal liner. I am a very cold sleeper and struggled to stay warm enough for comfort. About 1am the winds picked up significantly. At 4am the winds got wilder, the tent wall was constantly being whacked against me. Cooking breakfast was not possible due to the wind; there was no way we could light the Jetboil. We decided we would have our Cliff Bars for breakfast (rather than lunch) and stop for hot food at Stuart’s Pass, which is reported to be the closest less exposed stop.
We stayed at Brinkley Bluff until about 8am to be able to
watch the sun spread across the hills. I still had on all my clothing from last
night, plus a pair of trousers, my raincoat, hat and merino gloves. The wind
chill factor was massive! When I went to the toilet on Brinkley Bluff, I had
great difficulty pushing the door back open against the wind – it took all my effort,
and I was a little concerned I may not be able to get out.
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| One of Australia's more remote toilets (distant right) |
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| The little red patch of dirt in the middle of the photo is where our fellow campers are stopped for breakfast |
We set off again about 9:30am, getting to Rocky Cleft about 15 minutes later. 
The trail continued steadily down, with intermittent sections that were quite technical. The trail was not difficult, just required consideration of where to place your feet. In total it took as about 2 hours 20 minutes to get down from Brinkley Bluff to Stuart’s Pass. We were quite happy with this as we were only 20 minutes slower than the advised times and we know we are always slower on the descent than most hikers.
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| Stuart's Pass |
From Stuart’s Pass we turned left to travel along the creek. This was easy walking with only a few minor technical bits. We saw a lot of small butterflies of several types as we travelled along the creek. We arrived at 4/5 Junction about 12:30pm.
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| Mintbush Spring |
Section 4, which we covered over the last two days, is advised as the second hardest section of the walk. For me the hardest part of the Larapinta so far was the descent from Millers Flat to Standley Chasm. My hardest day so far was day 1 as I found the hardness of the ground brutal on my feet, day 2 was the hardest for Drew as he found boring and was feeling out of sorts.
The last two day we have had no flies due to the high wind, however once the wind died down, the flies were back. Fly-nets are a godsend and worth every gram they weigh.
In the afternoon we took a short walk to Birthday Waterhole and saw a dingo heading toward the waterhole. Birthday Waterhole has car-based camping, it is a beautiful and peaceful spot.
https://northernterritory.com/alice-springs-and-surrounds/see-and-do/birthday-waterhole
We returned to the trailhead for dinner and set up to sleep in the shelter for the night. We were joined tonight by a group of National Parks rangers from NSW and ACT who were walking the Larapinta as a holiday. The cleared the toilet, fixed the USB chargers in the shelter and generally made sure everything was maintained. They were also collecting rubbish as they went. They were high energy and were clearly having fun exploring a different part of Australia.
Statistics
Hike Distance 8.10km
Hike Time 3h 28m
Ascent 115.3m
Descent 614.0m
Walk Distance 2.68km
Walk Time 1h 5m
Ascent 30.5m
Descent 28.2m
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