Green flash.

Sunset at Wilpena, Southern Australia

The Flinders Ranges – a great swathe of mountains, uplands and plains – are pretty much the start of the outback proper. Everything until the Flinders is Adelaide’s back-yard... kind-of.

Strictly speaking of course, the Flinders National Park and Wilpena are not on the Stuart Highway that the Explorer’s Way follows. It’s a right at Hawker, and on: up. The soft wave of mountains shimmer out of the horizon. The terrain changes. The wheat fields that seemingly had no end are gradually replaced by savannah bush. The Flinders arrive with a subtlety that belies their beauty. 

We based ourselves in Wilpena Pound Resort. A kind of outward-bounds complex for walkers, cyclists, explorers and the like. Low cabins offer comfortable, spacious accommodation for couples and families, and the restaurant and shop serve up much appreciated staples. There’s a petrol station too, which helps. 

Don’t miss one of the sunset tours. Michael the guy who runs the Troopy (a 4x4 mini-bus) is one of the resident guides at the Centre. He wise-cracks the 20 minute drive to a vantage point on top of one of the mountains – Stokes Hill lookout, where he pops open some bubbly (sparkling shiraz anyone?) and hands round nibbles as the sun begins to dip.

Tonight we’re lucky: there’s enough cloud on the horizon to give some extra colour. I set the camera to time-lapse and sit taking in the view. The sky begins to turn to a dark blue. Only it isn’t really blue at all... it’s blue-green-yellow-fire-purple-grey-gold. I’m looking out across a whole load of nothing, drinking wine at sunset counting colours with a small group of strangers who are here doing the same thing. 

It’s a strange and beautiful experience... and when the sun drops to the horizon, flares and disappears you get a sense of the end of the day almost as if it was some new phenomenon and didn’t happen everyday. At the risk of sounding spiritual with a small s, you do feel an unusual sense of time, and space. Maybe it’s the ancient hills. Maybe it’s the going down of the sun. Maybe it’s the sparkling shiraz.

“Have you ever had the green flash?” asks Kent. I say I haven’t. “The green flash happens right at the point the sun hits the horizon. It’s weird. Look out for it.” 

Later, looking at the playback of the time-lapse on the bus back to the camp I’m momentarily puzzled by something. Was something wrong with the camera? I couldn’t quite work out what it was I was seeing. The sun was setting the wrong way...

But of course, in Australia, the sun transcends the northern hemisphere and sets in the west from the north. 

I pressed play and watched the sun set again and again and again and again, hoping for my green flash.