Our Australian Adventure: Westward to Alice Springs & Uluru

Been out of communications and unable to Post for a while because Monty & I flew to Alice Springs (AS) & Uluru in the Northern Territory of Australia via Melbourne onThursday, April 7, 2011. If you are looking at a map of Australia, you would think that AS is in the center of the country but I would say that it may be the ends of the earth – as we know it! The town has about 6,000 residents & tourism appears to be the main industry. The greatest tourist attraction for AS is a 5 hour drive southwest of AS. We decided to take a highly recommended bus tour from the Crown Plaza in AS put on by EMU Tours. It was an 18 hour tour and believe me the other 40 people became family after being together that long. We left the hotel at 6:00 AM and traveled through some incredible country, saw some unbelievable sights in The Red Center of the Country & enjoyed some inspirational Aboriginal stories.

Did you know that there are more than 1 million camels wondering wild in Australia? They were brought here when the railroads were built and let loose when they were not needed anymore. I wouldn’t have believed it until I saw them on the roadside to Uluru just grazing like cattle. We passed through stations (we call them ranches) that were hundreds of thousand acres. Australians now do their herding of cattle with helicopters. There has been triple the amount of rain this season so the cattlemen are looking for an incredible season.

Ayers Rock – now called Uluru (its original Aboriginal name) & Kata Tjulia are inspirational and said by many to be a great natural wonder of the World. This spiritual heart of Australia was the ceremonial grounds for the Aborigine people. Our guides, Tek & Warrick, took us on walks through the trails at the base of the rock formations and taught us much about the dream weavers, the geology & the foliage of the land. The day culminated with a barbecue & unlimited champagne at the base watching the sunset on Uluru. It was pretty incredible. I truly am grateful that we took the tour to Uluru but I must say that the flies were awful (I had to wear a net to keep them out of nose & ears) and the heat was intense (although this is the mild weather).

A most incredible adventure or maybe I should say – death wish – by many is to climb Uluru. 42 people have died attempting this “Bucket List” item. There were 5 in our group that attempted it & 2 that made it almost to the top before calling it a day. Just look at the pictures & know it was worse than the pictures show!!! I was truly afraid that we would be taking someone back to AS in a body bag. But, they came to their senses midway up!!

We returned back to the hotel at midnight and I spent an hour in the shower washing off the dirt & the fly larva.

On Saturday, I walked into town and spent the day lounging in the AS cafes, shopping through the shops & enjoying the locals at Bo’s Saloon. This is truly as “Outback” as I want to get in my lifetime!

Must comment on the night time sky in the Red Center! With no city lights or clouds within a hundred miles to diffuse the view - the night sky was beyond belief. Never realized that there were that many stars in the sky!!!!!!!