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Published: October 7th 2014
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The Devil's Marbles
This is a whole area of massive boulders. You can see how big these are - we're the little people standing next to the one on the left. And this wasn't an especially large one! While eating breakfast, we started to look at what was down the road from here to Alice Springs, as this is all new territory for us from this point. We don’t need to sight-see here as we did it last month so we’re pressing onwards.
The first spot that was on the map was the Devil’s Marbles. I’d checked it was a bitumen road on the short detour needed to see them – it was. As we pulled off the Stuart Highway onto the detour we could see lots of enormous boulders in front of us on both sides of the road. They were truly amazing. Some had been split in two and they were all weathered and rounded, some were even complete orbs perched precariously on top of other, bigger monoliths.
There was a short, 350m, walk that took you around the base of one section of the rocks and had a few information boards explaining how they were formed. They are made of granite (which contains feldspar, quartz and mica) and were laid down 600 million years ago. Over time, they have weathered and the feldspar dissolves into mud when exposed to the rain. This causes the
What Bird Will Emerge from This Egg?
No - it isn't really an egg. This is the effect of weathering on the large granite rocks in the Devil's Marbles. They eventually break apart. splits that have shaped them. The wind and rain then round them off. It also causes them to flake like onions, so large chunks fall off and are soon ground to gritty sand which forms the soil there.
One board also explained about two animals that are incredible survivors in the desert, the Desert Frog and the Desert Crab. Both of these end up in a waterhole as the creek dries up. Before that also dries up, they dig themselves a den in the mud, wrap themselves in plenty of water, and wait until the rains come again. How about that for survival techniques?
Our next stop, 18kms down the road, was Wycliffe Wells Roadhouse, known for being a place where UFOs are regularly seen. We went to check it out. We had to pull off the Highway onto a road which took us down to the River (dry for now) and past the enormous pipes that are meant to take the water under the Highway. This place must be underwater during the wet season.
The whole outside of the Roadhouse is one complete mural, showing night skies, aliens, space craft and people interacting with them. One
Aliens Arrive at Wycliffe Well
This fuel stop was full of wonderful murals and lots of news articles about UFO sightings in the area. Note the "space ship" on the far left that is parked in the "Landing Area" and the father and son "aliens" that have emerged. wall had several “USS Enterprise” ships and one Klingon craft, taken from Star Trek. At the corner of the building was a spot for parking “space craft” while booking in to the caravan park, with a triangular pyramid spaceship in it and two spacemen, a male and child who were bright green. It all looked wonderful.
Inside, the dining room had some aliens painted on the walls, stars on the ceiling, and a large space suit clad man touching a finger with an alien, looking just like God and Adam’s touch in the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City. There were also lots of copies of newspaper articles on the walls, about eyewitness accounts of seeing UFOs in the area. There was a very old Guest Book on the counter, which I flicked through and found a few entries by people who claimed to have seen some brightly coloured lights in the night sky, which moved strangely.
We had some lunch there, a pie and chips for Barry and a toasted sandwich for me. I also bought myself a little metal badge pin of the two green men, for my sunhat.
The final leg for today, to Ti
The Alien Touch
This lovely mural was on the ceiling of the restaurant at Wycliffe Well. It looked very much like the hand of God touching Adam in the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. Tree Hotel and Caravan Park, took us past a rest area labelled “John McDouall Stuart Memorial”. Barry was starting to flag a bit so we stopped for a stretch and drink. The Information Boards told of his expeditions from South Australia trying to find a route through to the top of Australia. He succeeded. On the way, he stopped at a mountain, which he named Sturt but was later changed to Mt Stuart. He determined that it was the very Centre of Australia. (This has been found to be incorrect using satellite navigation and it is actually around 200 kms South of Alice Springs.)
We then continued to Ti Tree, just 21kms further along, and filled up the ute (at $2.15 per litre!) which had just started warning us it was empty, then booked in for the night ($20).
We were told there was entertainment in the bar tonight so we went to have a listen. It was a country and folk singer with the amplifier up WAY too loud. The bar was also full of Aboriginal people drinking rather rowdily, so we had a look at the café and shop and settled on having our meal in
Baby Feeding Duty
This huge Wedge-tailed Eagle's nest was in a tree in the caravan park at the Ti Tree Hotel on the Stuart Highway. There were a pair that kept flying in to feed the eaglet tucked up safely inside. the van.
There were lots of birds around the place, with a stand-out being the Whistling Kite nesting high up in a tree nearby. We could see a parent bird bending to feed the young inside but couldn’t see the nestlings. There was also another peacock roaming around, but so far this one has stayed on the ground. Some other parrots were being kept in an aviary, including Princess Parrots, a Major Mitchell Cockatoo (pink), a Galah, a Corella and some pretty small green ones that followed every move we made and wanted us to stay with them.
After dinner, we settled down to watch a movies as we couldn’t get any TV reception. While we were enjoying the film, we noticed that the van was rocking quite violently. The wind had got stronger. We just hope it’s not on our nose as we head south, because that really slows us up and makes the ute use much more fuel. If it is, we’ll stay for another night until the weather improves.
It finally dropped at 2am. Hope it stays that way!
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