To the Outback - Part 3

The next day we set off for the relative short drive of around 4 hours to our next abode, a cattle station around 100km east of Ayres Rock, called Curtin Springs. We checked into our portacabin(!) before heading off to the Rock for the afternoon. We had decided to stay here because at $120 a room a night it was around 4 times cheaper than the cheapest hotel accommodation at the Rock. At Uluru (the Aborigine name for Ayres Rock) we were charged the rather dear price of $25 each to get into the park that surrounds Uluru and told not to do this and not to do that, including not to climb up the Rock because of the wind, which had risen to the hurricane-like proportions of a slight breeze! So Sarah and I walked around the Rock dodging the bus loads of Japanese tourists (although we did get some good pictures of the monolith) and managed to get to the sunset viewing area just before sunset.

The views were magnificent, albeit for only around 5 minutes as the sun set. Here is a rather different view of the Rock I took. Incidentally I was sober when I took this photo. However we were slightly disappointed with our visit to Ayres Rock overall. It was expensive and there were so many restrictions to what you could and couldn't do. The positives were that we managed to fit it in in the afternoon and that freed us up for a whole day to explore Kings Canyon and the surrounding area the next day. That evening we ate at the 'restaurant' at the Cattle Station and had a beer in the bar/shop. It was a very interesting place and was literally a cattle station with a small bar/shop, a campsite and a few portacabins for guests. The staff were mainly German backpackers who stayed there for a few weeks or months to earn some cash to travel around Oz. They could save their money up too, as there was no where to spend it, except for Uluru a 100km away, if they could get there that is. After our meal we got in the car and drove about 5km out of the Cattle Station to look at the night sky. It was amazing we could see so much, the milky way was like transparent cotton wool and we saw a few shooting stars. That night we were frozen in our portacabin, it did have a heater which were turned off because it was too noisy. It was so cold that the beer and wine we had brought with us was still very cold the next morning as it sat on the table in the room. You have to remember it is winter here and being in the desert it freezes at night while the days are very pleasant indeed.

On the Tuesday we drove to Kings Canyon and after filling up with petrol at near-UK prices we set off to hike around the Canyon. The views were breathtaking and we had a good 4 hour circular walk. It was warm and we dreaded to think what it would be like with temperatures of above 40 degrees in the summer months. We stopped at another couple of uneventful places on the way back to Curtin Springs. That night was not as cold but this time the cows were mooing all night which resulted in a disturbed nights kip.

The following morning we headed back to Coober Pedy and had to slow right down to 110km an hour as we crossed back into South Australia. We checked into the same motel and indeed the same cave. In the evening we went for a tour of the night skies. Not in a spaceship unfortunately but through a telescope. There were seven of us on this tour: myself and Sarah, a mother and teenage boy from Adelaide and an American man and his young daughter of around 8 years, as well as the tour guide. We drove in a mini-bus to a spot around 10km outside Coober Pedy. The night was really clear again and we could see 2 other galaxies low down, we also saw the colours of Jupiter and the rings of Saturn, orbiting satellites and interesting zodiac and aborigine star formations. You have to remember that Coober Pedy is in the middle of desert with no other settlements near it for hundreds of kilometres, so the views were amazing. Yet the Yank kept on asking stupid questions such as which way is Coober Pedy? Despite the lights of the town being pretty obvious. He also asked does Coober Pedy have an Astronomy Club? To which the guide wittily replied, "yes-me". I think the American's daughter was embarrassed by him. And the Yanks wonder why they get such a bad name around the world! Still it was funny and it didn't ruin a fascinating evening's night gazing.

We set off before 8 in the morning the next day, very early for us. This was going to be the longest stretch of driving at around 950km. Mid-morning we stopped at one of the many rest areas at the side of the road and I wandered down to a lake that we could see. It was a 15 minute walk or so to reach it, only to discover that there was no water in it at all, just hardened salt. It was really interesting as it looked as it if it had rippling water but this was just salt whipped up by the wind presumably and hardened over time. We reached civilisation (if you can call Port Augusta civilisation that is) at around lunchtime and continued south down the coast towards Adelaide. The weather became considerably colder and there were frequent showers. We finally reached the German settlement of Hahndorf, south-east of Adelaide, at dusk. We checked into our normal above ground motel and went straight for a German meal of saurkraut and sausages accompanied with large German hand-pulled beers - delicious. Hahndorf and other places in the Adelaide Hills were settled by Germans in the mid-nineteenth century and despite being forced to hide their Germanic roots a couple of times in the twentieth century, have since thrived on it and have become popular weekend destinations for Adelaide folk. The last full day of our holiday saw us hiking up and down some incredibly steep hills, more like mountains we thought. We also visited an Australian animal park, where I found I still had the charm as I had a couple of Birds eating out of my hand. Old talents die hard, hey? Sarah also fed the fat, lazy kangaroos and wallabies, some of which could barely lift their heads to eat more food given to them by the visitors. Sarah forced me to visit another winery on the way back to Hahndorf, where we got chatting to a nice couple again, although this time we didn't stay the whole afternoon. Instead we went into the spa and the swimming pool in the motel before having more German fayre in the evening. Sarah and I also watched the Aussie football team lose to the mighty footballing nation of Iraq, where we made up exactly half the number of people interested in watching their nation participate in the world game. There were many more people watching the oval shaped version of football on another screen. Incidentally the Aussies were moaning about all sorts of things like the heat, facilities and the preparation for the Australian national team in Thailand for the Asian Cup. The Iraqis had just a few more problems in their preparation for the tournament!

The next day we visited a few boring places such as a toy factory and a craft market, where Sarah got talking to a retired racist Scottish pensioner for ages before we headed back to Adelaide Airport. After we had checked in and gone through security Sarah had remembered that she had left our 4 CD's in the hire car. We rushed back but it was too late, the car had gone. (However we did get them back through the post later). The flight back was delayed for about an hour and we arrived in the rain of Melbourne before heading back to Echuca in the late evening. At a place called Kilmore I was stopped to be breathalysed again by the police. Kilmore Police!!! We finally got back at around 11 at night. It had been an action packed and eventful trip.