What is the best known natural wonder of Australia? Right, it's Ayers Rock. Today it's called Uluru again. That's the Aboriginal name. And where is it located? In Australia center, right in the middle. So you might think that's not far away from Alice Springs, mh? But it's still about a 450km drive, a little bit further south along Stuart Highway and somewhat west on Lasseter Highway. Mr. Lasseter was looking for gold in the desert west of Stuart Highway during the wild days. Nobody knows if he found some because he didn't come back. On the way you pass by [View Full Entry]

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Once it was what the name is telling you, a place to find water on the lang way south. Later on it became an important telegraph station and planes were made to connect it to Adelaide at the south coast via a railway line. Today Alice is still not a big city (around 30,000 residents) but it´s clearly a tourist destination. People come here visit the 'Red Center´ of Australia and to experience Aboriginal culture. Nowhere else can you buy so many digeridoo and other Aboriginal stuff. For Backpacker that do not jet around Australia it´s the hub for a visit [View Full Entry]

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Heading towards Australia´s center I first tried to hitch my way through the outback. There´s only one highway going south, the Stuard Highway, and I thought with the friendly Ozzies and a clear direction to head to it wouldn´t be a problem. But after about 300km in an outback town called Katherine I got stuck. Nobody seemed to go any further, the sun and the humidety were stewing me in my own grease. So I chose the pool option for the rest of the day and marveld at ever-changing outback vegetation from inside the airconditioned Ghan, a once adventurous but today [View Full Entry]

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Arriving in Darwin was like arriving in a different world (planet Oz). Suddenly everything was airconditioned, clean, working, and efficient. And right from the beginning I felt that Australians (Ozzies) are quite friendly and helpful. For a start the other passenger on my flight from Timor gave me a lift into the city center. Here I figured out another major thing had changed, the speed you spend your hard earned bucks as a traveler. Staying a night at a backpackers is about 15-20A$, about eight times as much as in Indonesia. But the standart is usually quite different, too. In the [View Full Entry]

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Already by the time I arrived in Bangkok I had thought about trying to reach Australia overland, meening to get there without flying. Partly because of getting a better feeling for the distance and partly because overland travel is cheaper and more interesting. My first real attempt to find a boat going to Australia was in Port Klang. But all the shipping agencies did not offer any kind of passenger service. The next possibility I had heared about was from Bali. People told me, that Australian cruise ships go there and sometime take additional passengers on their way back. But when [View Full Entry]

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After some days in Ende the ferry finally came to take me to the southern-most Indonesian island, to Timor. Since East Timor has become an independent country the Indonesian part is called West Timor. The only big town over there is Kupang which is still quite small. Among the local are a couple of Australiam escapists, some with Indonesian wifes. They meet at 'Teddy's Bar' every evening to play pool, stare at the sea, and get drunk. After a few days I found their company pretty depressing... they were not too helpfull for my plans of a boat to Australia. But [View Full Entry]

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During my days in Ende I got to know a bit more about the religious conflict between the islamic majority and other religious groups. About 88% of the Indonesian people are muslims. About 8% are christian and 3% are buddhist or hindu. The center of the islamic society is Java where most of the Indonesian people live. Flores in contrast is 95% catholic with only a small islamic minority. In Ende I visited the local church during a christening procedure for 69! children. Afterwards I had the opportunity to talk to a local journalist. He said that the christian community was [View Full Entry]

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By the time I was in Bali I decided to pass through the rest of Indonesia as fast as possible. On reason was the weather. The rainy season was full on and I met hardly any other backpackers outside Bali. In addition I was longing for a break from all that asian food and life style. I hoped to be able to reach Australia for christmas. Since flight prices from Bali to Darwin were still considerable and I had been told about a boat connection from Timor to Darwin I just took the next bus available and changing from bus to [View Full Entry]

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After a very long bus ride right into Jarkarta I found myself with little motivation of exploring this big city. So I took another very long bus ride right across all of Java and with the ferry to Bali. The touristic centre of Bali is Kuta, a beach town on a peninsular south of the capital Denpasar. Between the main street and the beach a maze of alleys offers every kind of accomodation, food, and souveniers a backpacker might think of, a bit like Bangkoks Khao Sarn Road relocated at a beach. But most of the places were pretty deserted. A [View Full Entry]

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After arriving in Indonesia I stayed a night in Padang to adept a bit to all the new things. Here I first had what is known in all Indonesia as 'Padang Food', in many places the only food. And I was not to happy with it. Being hot to very spicy and ready made in the morning it is than left for presentation (roting...) in the restaurant window. I did never get ill seriously from it, but certainly my stomach didn't enjoy it too much. A very distinctive and beautiful arcitectural highlight is the Minangkabau roof. Many commercial and official buildings [View Full Entry]

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