Blogs from Northern Territory, Australia, Oceania - page 311

We're just back from a fantastic 3 days in the outback visiting Australia's most iconic attraction - Uluru, or Ayres Rock as it's commonly known, as well as the Olgas and King's Canyon, and experiencing a bit of outback life, and it was great! We started from Alice Springs very early on Monday morning, as Uluru is a 5 hour drive from Alice. Our first afternoon was spent doing the base walk around the rock; the local Aboriginal tribes discourage people from climbing it as it's a sacred site to them, but plenty of people still do the climb. We decided not to partly out of respect for the locals, and partly because it's bloody steep and we weren't sure that we were feeling that energetic! The base walk was enough exercise for the first day! ... read more

Today we will complete our last day of travel on the tour bus we expect to arrive at hotel in Mitchell St Darwin sometime in the late afternoon. First though we are travelling to Litchfield National Park with the main attractions being unusual termite mounds, four great waterfalls and some curious sandstone formations. We first encountered the amazing Magnetic Termite Mounds all lined up in a North to South row with the highlights being the giant mounds built by the Cathedral termite. We then visited some of the falls that spill off the top of the escarpment including Wangi Falls which has a pleasant rainforest hike which we both enjoyed before climbing the trail that leads up above the falls which has some stunning views. After getting hot and sweaty we walked back down and climbed ... read more

After two great days at Ayres Rock it was time to hit the road, the first stop was on Lasseter’s Highway at Mt Connor then it was on to the Kings Creek station not far from amazing Kings Canyon. On arrival I decided to go up in a tiny little helicopter which was fun even though I was only up for 10 minutes or so the views of the property were also quite pleasant. We then travelled to Kings Canyon were we walked around the rim photographing the peculiar red domes before descending into the canyon and following Kings Creek to the Garden of Eden which has some lovely rare vegetation including ancient cycad palms. On leaving Kings Canyon we returned to the Stuart Highway and continued north to the tiny town of Stuart Wells where ... read more

The mission is to introduce Josh to the family and we are NOT nervous (ah-hem). As Darwin is the destination, a few side trips are definitely in order before we venture to the Top End. We flew into Sydney, hung out with some friends and then escaped the city by train to the Blue Mountains...ahhh, fresh air. Well, the Blue Mountains are incredible!! Although our pictures don't really portray them as 'blue', from a distance they definitely have a hazy blue look about them. There is tonnes of climbing to be done but unfortunately its way colder than expected right now. I guess that is understandable in the middle of winter. We found it really hard not to at least try a few routes but eventually gave up. Instead, we went on a few hikes. The ... read more

The last day with the car... I am getting very close to Darwin, the final destination of this part of my trip. One last place to visit - Litchfild national park. Since I slept so well in the car the night before, I started the day really early and had the whole park to myself in the morning. I stopped to take pictures of some HUGE termite mounds - far taller than me. The flies were so annoying there, I had to use my fly net again and even took a picture with it on, have a look. Then I wondered between the falls in the park - Florence, Tolmer and Wangi, all so beautiful. I took a hike to the top of the Wangi falls but that was really disappointing - you walk for an ... read more