A Town called Alice

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So here we are in a town called Alice....
The weather is ridiculously hot here and the ground is very red! Coming from Queensland the difference in landscape is overwhelming - the luscious green rain forest and now the dry red desert.

We were to commence our tour on the 21st September (which i'm sure everyone knows is a very special day!) unfortunately it did mean getting up @ 6am for a 6.30 pickup! Unfortunately no one told us there is a 1/2hour time difference between the Northern Territory and QLD, so we actually got up @ 5.30 - and our tour bus was an hour late - so we could of had a lot more sleep 😞

The story of the hour delay was due to the tour-guide, Bryce (first day on the job, and he had a supervisor, Sheldon "watching over him") leaving the luggage trailer open and losing 3 bags by the time they realised the mistake! We spent another hour at the office to try & sort it out when a call came and the bags had been handed in @ the police station by some kind person - we had some very happy people on the bus then! As a result our first night was upgraded to rigid tents and better cooking facilities - yippee!

We drove for hours on a very straight road with desert on both sides stopping off at the odd cattle ranch on the way. We had to make our way up the front of the bus to introduce ourselves and so i told everyone it was my birthday and they all sang happy birthday to me 😊 We arrived at our campsite for a quick lunch and then we were off to Kata Juta for a hour or so hike. We went through the valley of the winds and had to run after our hats as they flew off - Ree was very Indiana Jones in his hat!

Then we headed off to Uluru to see the sunset - it was amazing and Bryce and Sheldon served us champagne - don't let the plastic mugs fool you - we had the good stuff 😊
Then it was back to the campsite, Ree set about stoking up the fire and i opened my presents 😊 we slept in swags under the stars - it was a great day.

Next day we were up at a ridiculous hour to catch the sunrise @ Uluru and watch it change colour - we actually got to walk right next to part of it and its amazing just how big it is! After a full base walk we visited the cultural centre and learnt some more about how important Uluru is to the indigenous people. Then we had a long drive to our next camp - this was not upgraded and we were back in the swags around the fire. This time we only had the bonfire to cook on & as we all had to do the cooking - it wasn't a bad job! There were 4 veggies so we pitched in together and it was pretty tasty pasta that night! Ree stoked up the camp oven to cook the food and got a bit of an inferno going

The last day we were still up early and this was a visit to Kings Canyon - this walk was due to take about 3 hours but as everyone wanted so many pictures it turned into about 4hours! Bryce was great though and let us stroll about and pose - all the guides though the group queuing at certain rocks like they were queuing in Disney land was the funniest thing!

Then we just had the long drive back to Alice Springs - on the way back we had the good news that Bryce had got his wings - even after the mishap with the bags! This meant a big party back in Alice the night we got back and we all ended up at the guides share house after the pub for more drinks and games! It was a fantastic tour and we had a really good group and guide.

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