Alice to Adelaide Last Day

The next morning Max told us we were going to climb a mountain called the Dutchmans Stern (called this as it looked like the stern of Dutch ships back in colonial times), we all laughed at him until he pulled up at the car park and pointed to the top. It was over 800m high and the walk would be 3km long to get to the top.



It took us about 2 hours to get to the top and it was pretty tough going but the views were amazing. We could see all the way to Port Augusta and into the desert.




After this we returned to The Mill for lunch and then got ready to leave for Adelaide. On the way to Adelaide were going through the wine regions and so we just had to stop and do some wine tasting. We ended up buying a bottle of Reisling wine from the local vineyard. This was to be our last stop on the trip.



On the way to Adelaide to pass the time we had a quiz where made up questions for the other team mainly on things we had learned on the trip. We split the bus front and back and came up with some questions which included things like, how high is Uluru, what was the aboriginal word for waterhole, when was Max’s birthday etc. You will be pleased to know that team Gallard and Marcel won!



So once we arrived in Adelaide our trip was over, we said goodbye to the many friends we had made and arranged to meet up with some of the people who were going to be in Sydney.

Alice to Adelaide Day 5

The next day Max drove us to Kanyaka Homestead historic site. It was a derelict and abandoned settlement from when people first tried to settle in the area.



There had been 2 owners of this particular homestead. The first was a son of an earl, sent to Australia to make a name for himself. He bought the land and built a modest farm. All was going well until there was a major flood, the farmer saw his sheep were stuck on the other side of the river and so he tried to cross it to save them however he got caught by the current and drowned. A few years later the second owner bought the land and 60,000 sheep. He built a village down the road for his workers families and he built what we see that remains of today. Again all was going well until there was a drought, he decided to lead his flock back to Adelaide but due to the intense heat and lack of water he lost 20,000 sheep on the way there. After a few months in Adelaide the rain came and he returned to the homestead with his sheep. The next year the drought happened again so he had to return to Adelaide with his sheep where he lost another 20,000 on the way there. He never returned to the homestead leaving it to fall to ruins.

After the homestead we went onto look at an Aboriginal cave.



The cave had aboriginal paintings dating back over 1000 years, whilst we were listening to Max about the stories of the cave, Adam spotted that we were being watched. We looked high over the rocks and could see a kangaroo watching us.



One thing i need to mention are the thousands of flies. Not only when we were at the cave but just everywhere. They swarmed around everyone and as they seeked moisture constantly tried to get into our mouths and up our noses. I will never forget how annoying the sound of their buzzing was when they flew past my ears. After the cave we continued onto Wilpena Pound, a national park which is part of the Flinders Range. We did a 2 hour hike to the top of one of the high points in the park which gave us fantastic views of the Flinders Ranges. After Wilpena Pound we returned to The Mill for lunch. In the evening Max wanted to take us to see the rare yellow tailed rock wallaby. The others got ready to leave but I was quite happy to stay back and chill and get things ready for dinner. When everyone returned 2 hours later we tucked into our dinner of camel sausages, kangaroo steak, emu burgers and mash potato. After dinner we all went to the local pub.



I was told the story of how the pub landlord’s dog Shandy was grieving for her friend Bundy (as in Bundaberg rum) as he had recently been killed by a snake. So the landlord decided to buy a new playmate for Shandy who was going to be called Double Bundy.

Alice to Adelaide Day 4

Day 4 and this time we got to have a lie on, only a 6am start.



Max drove us around Coober Pedy to show us the mines, underground churches and the only house in the town which had a lawned fence. (The owner could afford the $900 a year water cost as she had gotten lucky in the opal mines). Max then drove us out to the desert to show us the Dingo fence (which is over 5300km long and goes through South Australia, Queensland, and New South Wales). The scenery was like being on Mars and in fact a few films were made there including Pitch Black, Red Planet and Mad Max, there was more evidence of this in the town itself as we saw props that had been used in the films.
After some more sightseeing Max gave us a chance to have a go at “noodling” for opals. He took us to a place where the first mines deposited their soil and as they didn’t value the milky opal as much to begin with, this allowed people to try and find their fortunes. To begin with we found nothing but then Adam found a small piece of opal, and then another and another.
We then set off again to make our way to Port Augusta.



Along the way we stopped at a pub to see the last 30 seconds of the Melbourne cup, where the “Midlanders” (Adam, Nadene and myself) won the sweepstake as our horse called Viewed came first and so we won a bottle of champagne to share. We had a quick stop for lunch at a local park in Woomera which is also the Australia Defence Force’s development and test site for rockets, Adam was in his element as we looked around some of the rockets that had been developed there.



After that we carried on down to Quorn where we would be staying for 2 nights. Quorn was a little village situated north of Adelaide, on the edge of the Flindes Range. We would be staying in “The Mill” which had recently been bought by Adventure tours Australia, the company we were travelling with. The Mill was lovely, it had a massive kitchen, large dining room and lounge with a tv and dvd player – luxury! In the evening we had a vegetarian lasagne. Whilst eating in the dining room the caretaker introduced himself. Rosco was in his 60’s and seemed quite witty. He found out it was Nadene’s birthday and said he would go home and bring back some special cookies for us. A few minutes later he arrived with a plate full which we devoured. After dinner Adam, Kris and Nadene joined Rosco down the pub and the rest of us chilled out in the lounge watching tv.

Alice to Adelaide Day 3

The following morning another early start. We would be travelling 730km along the Stuart Highway to get to Coober Pedy. We stopped along the way to take photos of us crossing the Northern Territory/South Australian border.



To keep us entertained on the long journey we played car cricket, whereby we received points for getting people in cars coming from the opposite direction to wave to us, it seemed to pass the time and was good fun.



When we arrived at Coober Pedy we went on an Opal mine tour. It was fascinating! Learning about how opals were discovered, the machinery used, watching the opal cutting demonstration and about how people lived there. Due to the fact the temperature varies so much, 85% of the towns population live in dugouts which are basically like man made caves either on the side of hills or actually underground. The tour took us through an example of a dug out, it was so strange. The opal mine tour leader told us of how she had recently bought a dugout for $25,000 and yet her car cost her $40,000. Also what was interesting was the fact that as long as you owned a property(had an address in Coober Pedy) then you could look for opals within certain restrictions of land size-hmm interesting, Adam told me to get the idea out of my head straight away! After our tour we were then shown our dorm which was a dugout(underground bunkhouse).



It was strange looking up our air vent which was almost 8 metres high. We dropped our bags off and went across the road for dinner. We all enjoyed a couple of slices of different pizzas and then as it was Nadene’s birthday the next day (a brummy girl on the tour with us) Adam and i ordered a slice of cake with a candle in it and we all wished her a happy birthday.



Following on from dinner we made our way to the hotel/bar dugout where we enjoyed a few drinks and a couple of games of pool. Then it was time for bed.

Alice to Adelaide Day 2

Another early start. We were up and away by 5am to go and see the sunrise over Uluru (Ayres Rock). Adam and I and a few others decided to do the 10km base walk. We were a little disappointed with the weather to begin with as there were clouds overhead and so Uluru looked a bit dull and grey, then suddenly we had about 3 minutes of sunshine and Uluru looked magnificent.



It was a deep earthy red colour. We carried on walking round and managed to take lots of fantastic photos – it was a good thing we had a digital camera! We all met back at the bus and the others told us that the viewpoint they had gone to, to see the sunrise from was very busy and crowded so we were glad we did the walk.



Later on we had a look around the Cultural Centre and then Max drove us to The Olgas (The Aboriginal name is Kata Tjuta). The Olgas are 36 domes and the highest dome is in fact taller than Ayres Rock. Very little is known about the Olgas with regards to Aboriginal stories as again it is a very sacred place to them, and for “white” people to know about is not good as they say “knowledge is power”. We walked through the gorge and again the views were spectacular we could even see Petermans Range. Max was very informative and told us of how Ayres Rock and The Olgas we only see a third of and the rest is hidden beneath the ground.



We made our way back to our campsite for lunch. We found out our group was made up of 8, 6 day passengers (including us) and the other 15 were only 2 day passengers so after lunch the 15 packed their bags and left. Then there were 8, which for us was a lot nicer as it allowed us to really get to know people. We had a bit of free time and so played cards, looked at each others photos and Adam, Nadene and Marcel had a swim in the pool. Then as the majority of us had done the base walk Max took us to a lookout point in the evening where we could see the sunset over Ayres Rock. The site looked very busy but Max took us to an area where there was no-one around and we all enjoyed champagne and nibbles whilst watching the sun go down over Ayres Rock.



After that we returned to the campsite, had dinner and then got into our swags for the night to sleep under the stars.

Alice to Adelaide Day 1

4am and my alarm went off. We showered and packed our beds and were ready for 4.45am pick up or so we thought. It turns out that we had forgot to change our clocks and there was a 30 minute time difference which meant we were really early, oh well at least it wasn’t the other way around.
We sat outside in the dark waiting for our tour guide but it was nice and cool. I was a little surprised to see loads of aboriginal people walking the streets at that time of the morning but there was a security guard on site to stop the aborigines hanging around the hostel.



Our Adventure tours bus eventually turned up and continued to make some other pick ups. With everyone on board we made our way to the first destination which was Kings Canyon, 7 hours away. It was a long drive but it gave us a chance to get to know people on the bus and have a snooze.
We arrived at Kings Canyon and were faced with a steep climb, fortunately it was a lot cooler than the day before which meant we could do the long walk around it. We checked out the Ampitheatre, Lost City and the Garden of Eden.



Max our tour guide (a young, enthusiastic lad from Adelaide) told us about how the aborigines were able to tell which plants they could get water out of and how they believe the canyon was formed. After 2.5 hours of walking we had been all the way round and had enjoyed the fantastic views. We then continued to make our way back to the minibus and to our campsite which was 4 hours away. Once we arrived at Yulara we all chipped in with preparing and cooking dinner.



Adam and I were very impressed with the fresh food that was supplied and tucked into our bbq of kangaroo steaks, sausages, beef steaks, salads etc. As it had been raining a little (very unusual) we couldn’t sleep outside but were happy to stay in one of the permanently erected tents which contained 2 single beds and a small table.

Alice To Adelaide Day 0

We arrived at Alice Springs at about 12pm. As soon as the plane landed and the doors opened, we were hit with a dry heat, it was 38c. We made our way to collect our luggage and then to the minibus which would take us to Toddy’s backpacker resort. On the way there we got chatting to Tim from Somerset and Jason from Canada. Tim had been travelling and working for 8 months in New Zealand and had decided to do the same in Aus. He was going to be stopping in Alice for just over a month. Jason had just finished his uni course the day before and had decided to do some sightseeing, he was booked on the Alice Springs to Darwin trip.
We got to the youth hostel and went to check in at reception. The lady gave us a map of the area and pointed out the highlights which were the main street and a few aboriginal art galleries. Adam and I both knew Alice Springs was going to be small but we didn’t realise it would be that small. We proceeded to our room which fortunately had air con and we lay on the bed for a little while in just our underwear as it was that hot! A little later Adam convinced me to go out and brave the heat to have a look around so we made our way into town. We had a look in a few souvenir shops and bumped into Tim and Jason who told us they had pretty much seen all there was to see in about half an hour and therefore were on their way to the pub as there was nothing else to do. Adam and i carried on and had a look at some of the aboriginal art, the only major shopping centre and that was about it.



So we made our way to the Bojangles pub and spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with Tim and Jason and having a few drinks. Later on we decided to make a move and grab some dinner back at the hostel and then go to bed as we had an early start. We met Jason for dinner and he and I had a normal meal ie fish and chips whereas Adam decided to be a bit more adventurous and try the kangaroo steak, which he really enjoyed. We said goodbye to Jason and headed to bed.