Travel Update

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So my hope to update our travels before leaving Australia (obviously) did not happen. Between my power cord disappearing in the last few days of Aldinga, to lack of power at powered camp-sites and finally having to send my computer and (pictures) home before we left for Thailand resulted in no update about our Aussie adventures. To provide everyone with a snap shot of what we did here is a quick synopsis of what we did:

Our outback adventure consisted of 12 days and over 5000km travelled. Starting in Adelaide we drove 3 days north to Alice (Springs) making stops at roadhouses and towns along the way. The most noteable small town was Coober Pedy, an opal mining town with many attractions underground! We gathered supplies in Alice and headed out to the East MacDonnel ranges where we able to do a few small hikes and started to fall in love with the Northern Territory. From there we travelled to the other side of the highway to the west MacDonnel Ranges and we continued to be amazed by beauty of the landscape. We hiked dry canyons of red rock and swam in water holes. The best of the water holes was Red Bank Gorge it is 2km long, every 10 to 30 m you had to climb over large boulders to get from one pool to another. Chris and I made it through 11 pools before we turned around. Of the Canyons Kings Canyon was our favorite, it is like visiting Mars and Jurassic park at the same time! Before we had to head back to Adelaide we stopped at Ayers Rock (Uluru) and the Olgas (Kata Kjuta) which was the inspiration for trip! Thankfully we were able to spend almost 3 whole days there hiking around, enjoying the sun rise and set over Uluru as well as taking a break from the 35 degree heat in the pool at the camp ground 😊

Our first night in South Australia was in Mclaren Vale (wine country) where we spent a lot of time on the weekends cycling from the beach to the cellars doors (for tastings) and back to the beach too cool off! Staying in the beach town of Aldinga was fantastic, it felt like we were able to see a lot of Australian culture, from learning to throw spears the way the aboringals do to watching an AFL game in Adelaide. As we were getting to leave we had ony wished we had more time to spend there!

When Chris' class ended in Aldinga, we took 6 days to drive to Sydney in a camper van relocation. This allowed us to take a fancy campervan (one with a tv, shower and ac) through two national parks (the Grampians and the Otways) and along the great ocean road! Besides the breathtaking views of the great ocean road, sleeping under the koalas was one of the highlights. From there we spent a few days in Sydney before taking a 9 hour flight to Bangkok! lol both Chris and I didn't think the flight would be that long, however flying Thai Airways made the flight fly by, hehehe.

My time is running out so I will wrap this up with saying our trip to Australia was perfect for us. We were able to see heaps of incredible things and found even more places to come back to visit.

sorry for the choppy entry will try to write more soon!

Beckie and Chris

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