So it was for me the other day as a friend driving from the coast to his home in Alice Springs stayed over in the Isa.

I have long looked for an excuse to head down to Fountain Springs and this was it. We stopped at the rest spot on the highway to take in the map of the country and then set off 23km south on a very passable dirt road.

I’m not sure what I expected to find at Fountain Springs but I didn’t have high hopes of seeing a great deal of water as we have not had much recent rain.

Of course what I failed to take into account was that it is a permanent water source bubbling up through the quartzite fault line independent of rainfall.

And while the waterfall was not cascading the waterhole itself was lush and inviting with a lizard swimming around to its heart’s content in a pool nestled in the ravine.

It was the perfect place for a picnic lunch and afterwards the lizard had to make room as it was time for a swim with the water temperature very pleasant neither too hot nor too cold.

Refreshed we set off back north to take in the abandoned mining towns of Bulonga and Ballara.

I was amazed by these remote ghost towns which in the early 20^th century bustled with life, schools, pubs, railway lines and working mines. 

They disappeared as suddenly as they sprang up in the 1920s leaving tantalising reminders of a time long gone.

We then detoured up to Mary Kathleen where my friend’s father was stationed as a mine manager in the 1970s. We toured the empty townsite and admired the azure lake but kept well away from its radioactive water. A fantastic day was ended by enjoying the sunset over a beer at Heywood Granite Mine. 

These are all great locations and would make a fascinating tour for people from the big cities looking for a different slice of Australia. I feel the tourist potential is enormous. DB