Split Rock Lookout is the second of three stops along the Arkaroola Ridge Top Tour, and is named after the view of two massive granite outcrops or tors (the lookout is also called Mount Painter Lookout). I later read an account suggesting that these enormous boulders represent the spirits of Aboriginal elders, and this was the sacred place where they come to die.
Behind the granite tors (to the north) is Mount MacDonnell, and then even further out is Freeling Heights and Thudupinha Hill.
To the north-east, a long valley leads to Glover Hill.
Directly south of Split Rock Lookout is Mount Painter, with Humanity Seat the long ridge to the left. Along with Radium Ridge and Mount Gee, uranium-bearing minerals were discovered on Mount Painter. One of the largest mines in in the area opened by the Radium Extraction Company of South Australia Ltd (RECSAL) was the No. 6 workings near Mt Painter. Both the Mount Painter and Radium Hill deposits were mined intermittently until the early 1930s, when mining ceased. Exploration at Mt Painter resumed in 1944, but the deposits proved to be low grade and uneconomic.
To the south-west is Mount Gee and Radium Ridge.
About the only direction that doesn’t offer an expansive view from Split Rock Lookout is to the west, where there is a small, unnamed peak.
As well as enjoying the views, the guides also talk about the geology of the area and pass around specimens of the different rocks that can be found.
At the lookout is a memorial plaque for Richard Grenfell Thomas – an Australian mineralogist and biochemist, and a senior research scientist in the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) – whose ashes were scattered on Mount Painter. He also studied the smell of rain, which was then termed “argillaceous odour”. One of his friends and colleagues was Mark Oliphant, a prominent nuclear physicist and Governor of South Australia, who had the nearby Mount Oliphant named after him.
“Petrichor”, well known to mineralogists as argillaceous odour, is commonly observed as the pleasant and refreshing odour which frequently accompanies the first rains after a warm dry period.
Science Direct – Genesis of petrichor
Getting to Split Rock Lookout
The only way to visit Split Rock Lookout is on the Arkaroola Ridgetop Tour, which leaves from the Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary reception. On most days there is a morning (8am) and afternoon (1pm) tour which takes about 4:30min.
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