Walking the rock

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Another early rise to watch the sunrise over Uluru which was far better than the sunset even if the sunrise was far to the left of the rock. We enjoyed some rather thick porridge and toast on a grill while the sun came up in the sky.

Feeling rather more awake, Fitzy dropped us at a car park just past the end of the Mala Walk we had done the day before so that we could complete the Uluru base walk. We spent most of this with Tom who was one of the English lads from Oxford who Andrew had been cooking scones dough balls with. The walk around the base went without any learning from Fitzy as the back of the rock is a sacred sight and as such it is meant to be disrespectful to tell the Dreamtime Stories there. The walk was however a great way of getting a good grasp of how large Uluru is and to see up close the large hollowed circles on the reverse of the rock where the wind and the weather had worn away the outer red stone. The shapes and slopes of the world's largest monolith are ironically much more stunning and far more interesting from the rear than the the most famous photographed side. This may also be because the Aboriginal people have requested people do not photograph the sacred learning sights at the back of the rock.

At the end of the walk we were met by Fitzy and a selection of cake and oranges to replenish our energy for the long journey back to Alice Springs. We stopped along the way at a Camel Farm. Andrew and I had had our fair share of camel riding, so amused ourselves instead by feeding the kangaroos and cooing over the joeys in their pouches. The owner also had a rather beautiful pet Dingo who they had rescued as a pup. Beautiful as it was, the Dingo still held onto its ferral routes; one weekend two guests left their small dogs outside and the Dingo managed to get off it's lead. Needless to say, the little dogs were never seen again. Some of you will recall the “A dingo stole my baby” story that made the news a few years back. An aboriginal tracker managed to track down the Dingo but the evidence was disallowed in court when the tracker was not allowed to be a witness by his tribe as he had not yet completed his initiation ceremony and become a man.

We spent the rest of the journey playing 20 questions and pictionary on the windows of the minibus. We got back to the Hostel and enjoyed the pleasure of a really hot shower and clean clothes before heading back to meet Fitzy and the gang at the Rock Bar for a burger and a jug of beer. It was lovely to chill and see everybody in the new light of cleanliness. After a few farewells and a promise to try and meet up with Tom and the guys in New Zealand, we headed back for a long sleep.

The next day we were checked out of the hostel at the mandatory 10 am however we were rudely awakened at about 4 am when an absolute prat had forgotten to turn off his alarm on his phone which then repeatedly went off every fifteen minutes until 5 am after we had all vocally complained and I had threatened to turn it off for him. He eventually apologised before disappearing without a trace.

We had hoped to visit the Reptile Centre but hearing it was rather small and only worth it if you were going to the presentation, we spent our last hour in Alice Springs eating chocolate and drinking coke from the local petrol station. It wasn't really our sort of town.

The airport shuttle took us back to one of the smallest airports I have ever seen let alone been to with only the one runway and where you can walk from arrivals onto your plane in ten minutes.

Back in Sydney we had a walk to take some pictures of the Opera House in the dark before it started drizzling. Thankfully our Hostel was providing free cheese and wine. We skipped the wine and instead enjoyed a lot of the cheese and crackers. After blog updating we headed to bed.

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