The Outback

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July 15th, Owen’s Reserve

Air travel in Australia is simpler. Going through security simply requires a boarding pass-no shoes off, no full body scans, not so even an ID required for domestic flights. After two days in Adelaide-a lovely modern city, we flew to Alice Springs, which I thought was the middle of no where.

I was wrong. Jeanette, Steve, Kevin, Heather and I packed ourselves into 4WDs, drove out to Owen Spring’s Reserve. Not content with the rugged road through the reserve, Kevin and Steve pulled off the dirt track and bumped along a creek bed where we bumped along until they were satisfied that we truly were in the middle of no where. Alone in the outback, we set up our camping gear and built a roaring fire. I stared at my primitive nighttime accommodation, announcing,

”I’m sleeping in a canvas coffin next to a creek.”

“No, you are sleeping in a swag next to a billabong,” Aussie Kevin corrected me.

The next day Steve and I drove back to Alice to pick up Amanda from the airport. She’d traveled from Hawaii to Los Angeles, to Sydney, to Alice Springs in the past four days and was suitably dazed.

“What is our camp ground like?” She asked wearily.

“Well, there isn’t really a camp ground,” I hedged. But the scenery is lovely. Flanked by Lawrence Gorge on one side and miles of eucalyptus, grass, and plains on the other, what we lack in physical comfort is balanced by natural beauty. The outback may be “the middle of nowhere” but it’s unique in its great size.

July 18th, McDonnell Ranges

We’ve been camping since last Wednesday. During the day we’ve been driving across the dessert, stopping at valleys and gorges to hike. Sunday we hiked Palm Valley filled, with its red cabbage palms and huge burnt orange rocks. Kevin had his GPS set to a Geo Cache, so we scaled a craggy section of the valley searching for the box to no avail. Sunday afternoon we drove to King’s Canyon crossing the McDonnell Ranges and arriving after dark due to losing a tire in the dessert. Steve capably changed the tire so adventure was averted.

Monday morning we hiked 6.5 kilometers around the rim of King’s Canyon. Amazing. The red rock formations were huge piles of smooth stones stacked around a plunging gorge. The climb took several hours and was quite steep in places.

July 19th Uluru

We did several easy walks around the base of Uluru, previously known by the Aussies as Ayer’s Rock, a huge red rock miles round the base and many feet high. We ended our day with viewing the sunset over Uluru, causing the rock to quickly change from orange, to red, to purple, to brown. Unfortunately we were did not climb the rock out of respect for aborginals, who consider it sacred and request that people not climb it. When I asked why it is sacred and why so many signs label the rock as “spiritual” and “important,” Steve informed me I’d have to be inducted into an aboriginal tribe to find out. However, I watched other people use the rope to climb, even admiring-along with many other impressed females-an athletic man run up the steep base in ten minutes while average people plodded along for half an hour.

Other highlights of today and this week include eating a kangaroo sandwich (tasty!), spotting wild camels, and observing the large quantity of red Lambrusca wine that Australians imbibe on a nightly basis.

July 20th , Kata Tjuka

Today was a strenuous hike through Kata Tjuka (“many heads” in Aboriginal), also known as the Olgas. The 7.4k hike was up and down many more huge rocks with breathtakingly beautiful gorges and billabongs. Amanda elected to hike only a small portion, while Jeanette, Steve, Kevin, and I hiked around the entire base. What amazes me about Yalara are the long spanses of desert randomly spotted with these enormous rocks miles wide. Shocking really.

Out of all our hikes I suppose King’s Canyon has been the most scenic and possibly the most challenging. Maybe that’s because I don’t appreciate a view unless I have to work to see it.

Reflections on our trip this far:
Amanda has been a happy camper. We give her Cokes and Cadbury chocolate regularly to keep her smiling, but she also seems taken with kangaroo meat, lamb korma, and Aussie iced coffee. The sweet Aussie iced coffee comes in cartons you can buy at gas stations; and Jeanette claims her grandfather invented it. Amanda and I were both entertained to discover that Aussies call anything cooked on a grill barbeque, and regularly throw mushrooms, onions, steak, kangaroo, and lamb on the barby. Amanda spent awhile explaining that in the U.S. BBQ involves the sauce-always. We were also entertained to hear “fillet” pronounced “fill-et”. In general Australia is a country of meat lovers. Oh, they also drink large quantities of wine, beer, and port.

The weather is freezing at night and sunny during the day. When we are at campgrounds we get showers and bathrooms, while when we’re in the bush we get, well, bushes to pee behind. Names seem to be unoriginal here. The bush is a huge expanse of land with bushes, gaps are large gaps in cliffs, and Palm Valley literally was a valley filled with cabbage palms.

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