Only two tourists visited the iconic Pink Roadhouse at Oodnadatta in South Australia’s far north during the four-day Easter break, as welfare organisations warn high fuel prices are also impacting the delivery of services.

Roadhouse owner Joe Calvert said it had been “very quiet” at the business, despite the area “looking incredible at the moment” with Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre brimming with water and bird life.

“[It is] down massively on what we would expect on a normal Easter break,” he told ABC News. 

“We’d normally expect to see 50 to 100 people a day, so yeah, very much down on what we would expect and what we staffed up for.”Joe Calvert has curly hair and glasses and is sitting in a room with white walls and a door behind him.

Pink Roadhouse owner Joe Calvert says only two tourists have been into his business during the Easter break. (ABC News)

Mr Calvert, who has owned the business for 18 months, said the Easter break usually marked the start of the tourist season for the area, but the lack of visitors meant he had to cut back on staff.

“We are just sort of going into maintenance mode and knuckling down and trying to get through to when the season starts, if the season starts, and just survive until next year now,” he said.

“We are receiving a lot of cancellations for the next couple of months, so it’s looking like it won’t start until June at the earliest.”

Mr Calvert said the business — which also operates a restaurant and offers accommodation — was not experiencing any fuel shortage and was lucky to have a local population to keep it afloat.

A large building exterior panted pale pink with two pink canoes outside. The sign reads 'PINK ROADHOUSE OODNADATTA' in black.

There is no fuel supply problem at the Pink Roadhouse in Oodnadatta. (ABC North and West: Isabella Carbone)

But he said his operating costs had risen due to high petrol prices, which had consequently driven up fees for freight, supplies and goods.

“The cost of doing business has gone up dramatically for us,” he said.

He suggested a fuel and accommodation voucher scheme — similar to that which was offered during to the state’s algal bloom last year — could help encourage more visitors to the Flinders Ranges and outback regions of the state.

Easter travellers thought twice about trips

Some tourists who took a break at Port Wakefield, a popular pit stop about 100 kilometres north of Adelaide, told ABC News fuel costs had made them think twice about their Easter getaways.

A young girl stands next to her dad with a row of cars behind them and a service station in the distance.

Dustin Williss travelled to Port Vincent with his family for the Easter break. (ABC News)

Dustin Williss, who drove from Adelaide to Port Vincent on the Yorke Peninsula with his family for the long weekend, said the extra $70 for fuel had “made us think about it, but didn’t change” their plans.

“We’d already committed to it, and it’s something that, as a family, we didn’t want to miss out on, so we did it regardless,” he said.

Similarly, Steve Potts said he carefully considered the rising prices before visiting Marion Bay for the weekend, while Henry Wallis said the extra cost for his trip to Port Pirie “didn’t quite change my plans, but I thought about it”.

Fuel crisis impacting service delivery

Deputy CEO of Hutt Street Centre Lauren Kilsby said about 200 people who were homeless, or facing homelessness, visited the centre each day for food and to use the facilities.

While that number is usually lower over the Easter weekend, she said the centre often had an influx as it came to an end.

“Tomorrow will be one of our busiest days of the year,” she said.

While the centre has had a steady increase of people using its services year-on-year with the cost-of-living crisis, the current fuel crisis is impacting how the centre can be run.

“What we really have seen in the last week or so and the last couple of weeks, which is worrying, is we’re having a number of our volunteers having to call in and say they can’t come in because of the fuel prices,” she told 891 ABC Adelaide.

“Volunteers are the backbone of our organisation and if we don’t have our volunteers, that’s a bit of a scary thought.

“We’re a bit worried about that at the moment and we’re going to see what we can do and hopefully come up with some ideas to help people get in and help us keep our doors open.”

South Australian Council of Social Service chief executive officer Catherine Earl said people were “really struggling” to make decisions on what they could afford week-to-week and social services were not immune to cost-of-living pressures.

A woman with glasses in a dark room in front of a coil heater.

Catherine Earl says fuel costs are also impacting welfare agencies. (ABC News: Carl Saville)

“We’re having fuel increase, we’re having food increases in prices, people are really struggling making decisions on what they’re going to pay on a weekly basis,” she said.

“Can they afford to fill that script of medicine, or do they need to feed their children?

“We all know that the prices are hitting families and communities, but these price increases are hitting the social services that deliver them as well.

“We [social services] are not immune from petrol increasing. That’s going to impact any service that has to outreach into the community.

“We’re feeling a lot of pressure in the social service sector at the moment and we’re doing the best to deliver what we can in terms of the demand out there in the community.”