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Published: February 19th 2018
Mount Connor
Is this Uluru.........no, it's Atilla!Today we leave the 'massive' conurbation of Alice Springs (population about 25,000!) and head out into the remote wilderness of the Outback, to the 'Red Centre' and also the 'Dead Centre' of OZ. A modest journey of about (460 km or about 280 miles), initially due south down SH87, the Stuart Highway, for 200 km and then, following a right turn at a place called Erldunda, on to the Lasseter Highway for the remaining 260 km! In effect, 460 km of straight road driving, with only one 'turn' and the odd 'bend' to test the driver - amazing!
Our destination is the iconic Australian landmarks of Uluru (or Ayers Rock as it is also known) and Kata Tjuta (or 'Many Heads')' both of which are in the same National Park, together with King's Canyon (about 200 km away from Uluru); two of the most isolated spots in the whole country. The Ayers Rock Resort, consisting of five or six hotels, is actually in a place called Yulara, about 15 km from the National Park and with a permanent population of only 1,000, Yulara makes Alice look like a major city.
After picking up some supplies for the journey at
Red Centre
The sign that we're here! the local 'Woolies' and popping back into the airport (which was on the way) to add Mandy to the named drivers (I had forgotten her driving licence the previous day), we were on the road proper around 9.30, with the journey expected to take 5 hours or so.
We knew that the road was sealed (i.e. Tarmac) the whole way, but didn't really know what sort of condition it was in. In actual fact, it was absolutely fine and with probably fewer potholes on the whole route, than you are likely to get along a mile of road at home, although this is probably due to the paucity of vehicles using the road. There were a few trucks or Roadtrains and also a few tour buses, but if we saw a hundred vehicles in total on the road, travelling down to Yulara and back to Alice a few days later, I would be surprised!
There are no townships at all on the whole journey, but there are four fuel stations shown on the map...............although one of these called Mount Ebenezer, is now closed. The other three, Stuart's Well, Erldunda Roadhouse and Curtin Springs all have cafes/grocery stores attached,
Field of Light 1
This is my photo.... but whilst they are definitely not service stations like we see in the UK, they nevertheless provide a very valuable, if not critical service to travellers along the road. You are advised to keep your vehicle topped up with fuel at each of these places, because the area is so remote and with very limited mobile phone signal if any, running out of fuel just isn't an option! Erldunda Roadhouse is worth a special mention, bearing in mind that it describes itself as being situated in the 'Centre of the Centre' of Australia. Whether this is entirely true or not, I really don't know, but looking at the map, it certainly looks at though it could be right.
A few miles after we turned on to the Lasseter Highway and remember that there was very little real traffic on the road, we actually came across some major 'red earth' moving works along either side of the road AND lo and behold, we had to stop at a red light, while we waited for vehicles to pass, coming the other way.........none did!
Other than passing a neat sign for the Red Centre, at the turn off for SH3, the
Field of Light 2
.......this one isn't! route we would be taking for King's Canyon in a couple of days, there is nothing much to report for the rest of the journey to Yulara. Having said this, we did, sort of, come across 'Uluru' earlier than expected, when we saw a red mountain come into view. 'Is that it?', we all said; 'It's not what I thought it looked like!'. However, a little further along, we arrived at a look out point and it turns out that 'Uluru' was, in fact, Mount Connor (or Atilla), the third of the main, Red Centre mountains after Uluru and Kata Tjuta. As Tim probably said, 'You've seen one mountain, you've seen them all!'.
After, pretty much, 5 hours on the dot, we pulled into the Ayers Rock Resort and our accommodation for the next two nights, the Outback Pioneer Hotel and Lodge. Heidi checked us in at reception and very helpful she was too, particularly in assisting us plan our 'activities' for the next couple of days. Although there are definitely swankier hotels in the resort, this place was ideal for our needs, being relaxed and casual, with a good sized room and dining options ranging from pizzas and
Yulara
The path to the town centre. sarnies, through cuts of meat you could purchase and then barbecue yourself and finally, fine dining if you wanted it. There was also a guy playing on guitar (with lots of additional gizmos) in the evening and he was a real crowd pleaser!
Not that we saw too much of the hotel as it happens, because (and you may be surprised to hear this), our agenda was pretty packed for our few days in the Outback! First things first though, we did take the opportunity to catch a bit of time by the pool, especially as the temperature was well north of 40C by this time! However, the thing about the heat here, is that it is DEFINITELY very hot, but it is also a dry heat which, in our view, makes it much more bearable - 40C+ here is certainly more comfortable than 30C in Singapore! Having said that many people think that this 'dry heat' thing is a fallacy and it does remind me of that classic picture of the two skeletons sunbathing in their deckchairs, with one remarking to the other...........'At least it's a dry heat!!!'.
After our interlude by the pool, it was time
Uluru 2
.......and more.... to shower and change and grab a quick pizza, before our trip out tonight. This trip was an added bonus which we thought we were going to miss, but no, Lady Luck was shining on us and the Field of Light exhibition in the desert had been extended to the end of the year. This exhibition has been designed by a Brit called Bruce Munro, a name that Mandy & I know very well, because BM was the designer, for a few years, behind some very special Christmas lighting (including a Field of Light there as well) at a National Trust property near us in Buckinghamshire, called Waddesdon Manor. However, the one at Uluru was a touch bigger.......in fact about ten times bigger, with 50,000 lights, in a multi million dollar installation.
Access to the exhibition is controlled, such that it has to be reached via a tour bus, although this only took a few minutes to arrive at the site, from our hotel. When we did arrive, it was obviously dark and the guide's first job was to explain that we were able to follow dirt paths all the way through the lights, but warned us that we
Uluru 1
Stunning colours... should not step off the paths, because.............none of us know what critters might be out there!! Secondly, she explained that although the exhibition is amazing, it is 'only the second best light show out here; just look up for the best one!!'. And she wasn't wrong! I have never see a starry sky like it, with the Milky Way strung out before us. It was incredible, but unfortunately, no way that my camera would capture it!! So I've cheated with the picture on this one and downloaded one from the Internet.......Soz!! Just about an hour at the Field of Light, but pretty magical, then back to the hotel, listen to 'man on guitar' for a while and then bed.
The highlight of day two was an 'Uluru Sunset Tour and Barbecue' with AAT Kings, the major tour operator on OZ. We were to be picked up at 3.00 pm and then driven to Uluru (about 20 minutes away), spend some time at the Aboriginal Cultural Centre to learn more about the people and their culture. Then there would be a guided walk around part of the base of the mountain to the Mutijulu Water Hole, before driving around the
Uluru 3
......and more still... other side of Uluru to watch the sunset and finally, a barbecue under the stars. We could expect to get back to our hotel around 10 pm.
As this was going to be pretty 'full on', we decided to take it fairly easy during the first part of the day, with a visit to the Resort 'Town Square'. Mandy and I took the 15 minute walk over there, via a desert path, while Tim drove over to protect Sue's knee. We had a coffee and cake brekkie and a look around the pretty square and its shops, before also popping into the Visitor Centre to get a map for our proposed sunrise visit to Kata Tjuta tomorrow morning, about more later!
The next paragraph includes some fruity language, so please scroll on to avoid any offence! It was when we walked into one shop, that I saw the headline to beat all headlines in a major newspaper. If it had happened in the UK, the headline might read something like, 'Uproar over sex pest's lenient sentence.' In Australia, they don't beat about the bush, so to speak, so the paper's headline read, 'Wanker gets off lightly! Masturbator to
Uluru 4
.....and Mutijulu water hole... be released after hard time in jail!!'.........priceless!!
Back to our hotel, for another bit of pool time, before a snack lunch and then getting ready for our trip. The tour was really well organised, with the first surprise being, how close the road gets to the mountain.......which is, very close! The second surprise is at the 'climb point' (which is the place on the mountain where climbers are allowed to start their ascent), and how steep it is......which is, very steep! The indigenous Aborigines, the Anangnu, have announced that any climbing of their sacred mountain, will be prohibited from the end of 2019 and in the meantime, have asked that travellers refrain from climbing, something we all respected of course. The fact that there wouldn't be a cat in hell's chance of getting me up there, is you might say, purely coincidental!! A point that was emphasised by our guide reminding us that if you were to climb the mountain and injure yourself, no insurance company will cover you and the last person who had to be rescued, incurred a bill, including rescue and medical costs, of over $135,000!!
I mentioned that the Anangu consider Uluru to be
Uluru 5
.....it had to happen, the Uluru selfie... sacred and whilst we were able to drive right around the mountain, we were asked to refrain from taking photos in the particularly sacred areas, at least in close up - taking pictures from a lot further away didn't seem to be a problem. Anyway, we stopped at part of Uluru, where tour parties are allowed to walk around, take pictures and learn about the flora and fauna, hear stories about the Anangu's mystical past (a bit like Greek mythology, I suppose, but seeming to mainly involve snakes!) and visit Mutijulu waterhole, one of only three waterholes around the mountain and in which only the Anangu are allowed to bathe. This waterhole can dry out, but rarely does and is fed by a constant trickle of water from inside the mountain.
After an excellent walk, with a lot of fascinating info from our guide, we reboarded the coach and, following a quick photo stop a little further on, at the climb point, we then moved to a viewing point about three hundred metres or so from Uluru to watch the sunset. And this threw me, because I was assuming that we would watching the sun set over the mountain,
Uluru 6
....the changing colours in the setting sun... but no, it was the complete opposite! Well not the complete opposite I suppose, because that would mean 'Uluru setting over the sun', which is faintly ridiculous, of course. No, we were watching the way the rays from the setting sun affected the colour of the Rock and for the first time in my life, I acually took photos of the sunset, pointing AWAY from the sun itself!! As we waited for the sun to set and clicked away as the colour of the rock changed, the tour company had laid on wine and nibbles for us to enjoy, before we decamped to our BBQ under the stars, back near the cultural centre. The sunset was pretty special and the colour changes of Uluru quite beautiful.
The BBQ was excellent, with sirloin steak (cooked to order), chicken kebabs, lamb sausages, prawns and kangeroo, plus loads of potatoes, rice and salad, etc. The kangaroo was interesting, tasting like steak, but with the texture of lamb and was very 'springy' as you try to cut int it!! There was also a lovely Lamington cake, with cream, for dessert. But that wasn't all...........oh no!! Just as I was thinking that there weren't
Uluru 7
......getting redder.... many stars out, the staff turned out all the lights around the BBQ site, plunging us into darkness and......wow.....the sky just lit up with thousands upon thousands of stars. I thought the sky last night at the Field of Light was good, but this was sensational! We then had a half hour astronomy talk, from the chap who cooked the steaks (!!) and he was brilliant, using a laser pen to point out the particular stars he was talking about. Sue pointed out that she had been tracking a light moving across the sky, which our host thought was the International Space Station. He explained that this orbited at a height between 180 and 220 km above Earth and to put this in perspective he said, the nearest McDonalds Restaurant in Alice is, incredibly, over twice as far away!! A great end to a great day, following which we were taken back to our hotel and.....to bed, 'cos we had another very early start tomorrow.
We didn't have to do it, but as we were here, we decided to go out to see the sunrise on Kata Tjuta, the sister mountain to Uluru in the National Park. Sue, sensibly,
Uluru 8
....and redder... decided to stay in bed, but Tim, Mandy and I were up at 5.30 am, chucked on some clothes and drove out to the KT Dune viewing point about 30 minutes away, a bit if a race against time, with the sky starting to redden in the rear view mirror as we drove along. When we reached the viewing point, there were probably about 50 other hardy souls there, but there was plenty of space to get a good picture-taking position. Once again, we were watching the effect of the sunrise on the colour of Kata Tjuta, but this time, we were also able to see Uluru in the distance, with the sun rising beside her. Quite magical and well worth getting out of bed for! The only slight drawback was being plagued by flies, but that was a small price to pay.
Sunrise done, it was then back to the hotel to 'get up', check out and depart for the next stage of our 'Red Centre Experience', at King's Canyon. First things first, we had breakfast in the Town Square, picked up some provisions for lunch and were on the road about ten. The drive to King's Canyon
Uluru 9
.....and redder still. was pretty straightforward, back down the Lasseter Highway and then up SH3 for a total of 200 km and a drive of only a paltry 3 hours! Nothing eventful on the journey, but we did see some wild camels and were able to get a few pics. We arrived at the King's Canyon Resort, which is the only hotel in the area and is a mix between normal hotel rooms, bunk rooms and a campground. The rooms were absolutely fine, albeit a bit rustic, with a lot of deserty, bush type vegetation all around, which added a layer of 'excitement', wondering what beastie boys were out there! In addition, for some reason, all the rooms were raised off the ground by about a foot and the one place I definitely wasn't going to look, was in the gap underneath - who knows what was lurking there!! There was a small pool close to our rooms, but with the hotel being pretty quiet, it was almost our own private pool and it was while we enjoying a couple of hours there, that we first heard the nagging tone of what we ended up calling, the 'Timothy Bird'; chirping away 'Tim-oth-y', 'Tim-oth-y'
Uluru 10
Not my picture, but the sky was just like this! virtually non stop. Next to the pool and, therefore, handy for our rooms, there was also a surprisingly good and large restaurant called Carmichael's, where I had Barramundi fish that evening in a nut and onion crust - delicious!
The main reason for coming to the King's Canyon Resort was, funnily enough, to see the King's Canyon, a gorge which is, I suppose, a mini (in fact, very mini) Grand Canyon. Now, there are two hiking walks at the Canyon, one called the Rim Walk (which is about 6 km long and takes about 4 hours, including a climb up 566 steps carved out of the rock face to get to the rim) and the other called the King's Creek Hike deeper into the canyon (about 2.6 km and 2 hours or so). We had hoped to do the Rim Walk, but when we arrived at the hotel, we discovered that both walks were closed because of the heat, which at 40C+ would simply be too dangerous, with the risk of sunstroke, heat exhaustion and/or dehydration (or, all three!) just too great- especially as the temperature is apparently 10 degrees HIGHER at the rim of the canyon! We had
Kata Tjuta 1
Some of the 'many heads' at sunrise... two choices; do the Rim Walk tomorrow morning, starting around 5.30 am when it would be a bit cooler, or choose another shorter walk called the King's Creek Walk, a 2 km stroll along the canyon floor, and which was still open to do.
Wisely, I think, we elected to do the 2 km stroll, which we drove about 5 km out to the Canyon, to do at around five that evening. And a lovely walk that was too, with some cracking trees and plants, a bit of wildlife and some fantastic colours of the canyon walls. We saw the 566 stone steps of the Rim Walk climbing up the cliff face and were pretty glad that we 'passed' on these in this heat, which even at early evening time, was truly intense! We didn't quite make it to the end of the walk, because a major rock fall had blocked the path and destroyed the viewing platform last year, but we were still able to get some very decent views. A really worthwhile walk, if you don't have the time/energy/or opportunity to do the longer hikes. When we got back to the start, the park ranger was just
Kata Tjuta 2
.....and some more.... changing the signage of the main walks to 'Open' for the next morning, so it's pretty clear that the opening/closing of these routes is taken very seriously.
Back to the hotel, a few quick pics from a viewing platform of the sun setting on the outer wall of the canyon (we've seen far better), then it was a couple of beers, change for dinner, a good meal at Carmichael's (although how they would cope when they are busy, I really don't know!) and then bed!
After brekkie at the hotel, we set off for our 475 km trip back to Alice Springs, down the SH3, on to the Lasseter Highway, before turning north at Erldunda Roadhouse back on to the Stuart Highway. Which reminds me, I was talking to the Aussie Chef at the KC Resort, the previous afternoon and he told me a story about one of the campers staying there, who asked for directions to the nearest McDonalds. 'Sure', said the chef, 'go down this road to the end, then turn left; go down that road to the end and turn left, then go down this last road and turn left once again and it's just
Kata Tjuta 3
All the 'heads', with the sun almost up... there.' 'Great', said the camper, 'how long will that take?' 'About 6 hours', said the chef!!!
The drive back to Alice was fairly uneventful, apart from Mandy (who was driving at the time) deciding to turn right when got to the Lasseter Highway (back towards Yulara), instead of left, but fortunately we were all awake at he time and a U turn sorted it straight away! Our plan was to get back to Alice asap and then try and do the two things on our list, namely the Royal Flying Doctor Museum and Anzac Hill, a military memorial and high point over the town. We got back about 3 pm and went straight to the museum, which was well worth the visit at $14 per person. People of a certain age will remember the series called The Flying Doctors on TV and our guide was keen to point out that they try to ensure that daily flying operations are a lot less dramatic, than depicted on TV. However, there is little doubt that the RFDS fleet of aircraft, crew and medical staff provide an amazingly valuable service to people in the remotest parts of the outback. They are proud
to say that they provide medical coverage to about 280,000 people, which may not sound very many, but those people are spread over hundreds of thousands of square miles of isolated country, mainly Outback!!
There is a lot of fascinating information in the museum, including stuff about the founder of the service, an incredibly persistent and caring, Presbyterian minister called John Flynn and also a communications genius called Alfred Traeger, who came up with the idea of a bicycle pedal powered generator to run the radio in the Bush; in addition, as this radio was operated using morse code and they found that this was resulting in a lot of mistakes in messages, he developed a simple keyboard, which enabled the operator to push a letter on the keyboard and this would then generate the correct morse code. Finally, to prove the simplest ideas are usually the best, a nurse came up with idea of producing a picture of the human body (a body chart), broken up into sectors, each of which was given a letter. The person who was ill, could then tell the doctor over the radio, precisely where it hurt, by reference to this lettering system,
Kata Tjuta 5
....and looking back at Uluru with the sun up.. a system that is still in use today, in medical kits provided to every one of those 280,000 homes (and kept up to date) by the RFDS. The RFDS have used a wide range of aircraft over the years, but the aircraft of choice today is the Swiss manufactured, Pilatus PC12, a plane that cousin Dave Munday, the family aeronautical engineer, is very familiar with and, indeed, in which I have been privileged to fly a few times in years gone by.
After leaving the museum, we drove the short distance to Anzac Hill, a memorial to the fallen military of Australia and New Zealand, in conflicts since World War One. This is a high point above Alice, although It's fair to say that the town is not the prettiest we have seen. You do, however, get a decent view of the McDonnell Mountains in the distance, which is worth the visit. After checking back into the same hotel we were at a few days ago, we freshened up, then went out to dinner at a bar in town, before going back to bed after a quite amazing few days. Our trip in to the Outback was everything we
King's Canyon 1
.....who're you looking at? hoped it would be and a visit to Uluru, Kata Tjuta and even King's Canyon really should be on anybody's wish list when travelling to OZ. Tomorrow, we fly to Perth and our final state of Western Australia. Our journey is nearing an end, but there are still some great things to see.
Just one quiz question today, but it's a real teaser:
* Uluru is considered to be 'one rock' that has projected through the earth's crust; bearing that in mind, how much does it weigh?
That's all folks!
TTFN
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Marie Blakeley
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Fabulous photos Paul. Those stars are something else.