Judy & Brian Tour Oz

Up early this morning and jumped on the Ranger guided tour of the Mala walk. Listening to the explanation of how the rock was formed and the part that it has played in the lives of the Aborigines brought a new insight into this fascination culture, a world away from ours. She explained about the Song-line and how the story starts way up north and ends way down south, the only way to hear all parts of the story is to be in the place where that pat of the story takes place. Even if you knew the other parts of the story, you are forbidden from relating it anywhere but where it belongs. Then there is the small complication that you only know the story as it is told to a person of your particular ‘level’ within the aboriginal life. Until you reach the next level through initiation, you will never know anymore of the story than you already know. What is sad is that the elders that know it all are just not able to tell anyone else so it can’t readily be written down and dispersed to the un...

Saturday 28 April Kata Tjuta was our first destination today. This was somewhere I have always wanted to go and OMG,OMG,OMG it was amazing. So totally different to Uluru in shape, texture and formation. We headed to the Walpa Gorge Walk and were totally blown away by everything about it. Sheer red cliffs, lovely waterholes and little streams flowing over the floor of the gorge into little pools. It felt older than time and it was very easy to imagine the indigenous people spending time there. In fact it was hard to imagine them ever wanting to leave this place.  The rock formation looked like it was made of conglomerate with the stones within the boulders perfectly round. Just like Uluru it was an amazing red colour with lush greenery growing along the water courses. It is impossible to choose between Uluru and Kata Tjuta as they are both awe inspiring. We could have spent hours there and will return tomorrow to check out the Valley of the Winds. Brian took a million photos and I w...

Friday 27 April Distances are tending to become a blur, especially when you are travelling 300 kms with basically nothing at all between your departure point and destination. On the upside, the landscape is becoming a tad greener with some actual trees here and there. It is also a little bit hillier so not quite so boring. About 80 kms from Yulara, you get a small thrill when a very large mountain appears on the horizon. Impressive as it is, you can’t but feel a little disappointed when you realise it is Mt Connor, not Uluru. We continued on with our eyes peeled and when finally around 20 kms from our destination, there it is, Uluru. It is absolutely massive and it’s red colour almost exactly echoes the colour of the land around us. After we settled into the campground, we had a quick look around the resort shopping complex bought a few needed supplies and then set off to have a closer look at the rock, which is about another 15 kms down the road. As you get nearer, the sheer size of t...

Thursday 26 April Another day of driving along the great road of nothingness covered in grey saltbush and not much else. Even when you come across the odd tree on the landscape it must be too hot in summer for it to have real leaves, instead it has what looks like needle shaped leaves. We made the obligatory stop on the SA/NT border and continued on to Kulgera about 22 kms further on. We stopped at the roadhouse along with a lot of others. Facilities not too bad considering where we were but unfortunately Telstra didn’t reach us there. Had a drink at the pub/roadhouse during happy hour and considering a glass of wine was $4.50 for chateau cardboard, I‘m glad it was happy hour!   Snap of the day Might officially be the middle of nowhere    

Wednesday 25 April A straight run through into Coober Pedy. The scenery along the way isn’t quite what we had imagined. Even though there is absolutely nothing to be seen anywhere, the road is not dead flat and meanders occasionally over gently undulating hills.  The only excitement we had was an ambulance flashed us as he passed and we didn't know why, then about 400 metres further on we could see a flock of emus on the road. Brian slowed right down and gave them a toot on  the horn which made them scurry all over the road.  Brian was very busy watching them pass across to our right before we started moving again and just as he began to move another idiot emu ran across from our left, got a bump on its rear end and did  forward roll across he road. Don't worry he was OK, quickly jumped back up and joined his mates over the other side of the road. Mind you it did feel like us 1, emus 0!  We arrived in Coober Pedy around lunchtime and it is nothing like we expe...

You pull out of the van park in Port Augusta right onto the highway to Perth. 100 metres down the road is the sign where you turn north – to Darwin. Now we are definitely on our way. Our first stop is at Woomera, described by all as ‘an outback town’, so it’s official, we’re in the Outback! The country is vast more than flat. There’s just so much of it. You drive for an hour and at the top of a slight rise there is s photo opportunity, a view over one of the many dry salt lakes. Woomera had an interesting display of all the rockets and unmanned jet aeroplanes they buzzed about with. It’s a pretty big town, and hard to tell if there’s actually anyone here apart from the info and museum staff. Pulled into Glendambo for the night – our first van park behind a roadhouse. Its just huge, must hold a hundred vans and twice as many campers. Today it’s just a big empty patch of dirty gravel, but as the sun sinks slowly in the west the dawdlers are all pulling in off the highway. Bit safer th...

Disaster! While pulling out of the van park at Hawker, I turned in too early and the van brushed up against a tree. Unfortunately one of the branches ran along top part of the side of the van, dug in and poked a 20mm hole right through the side. I knew I was in trouble when I backed away and the branch broke of and stayed sticking out of the side of the van. Grrr. I guess it had to happen. Oh, well, bought some gaffa tape and covered up the hole on both sides. No point in getting it fixed until we get back. Who knows how many other little surprises are out there? Having done the damage, I felt no concern with towing it down a dirt road to have a look at the ruins of  Kanyaka Homestead started in the 1840’s and abandoned in 1880. At one time it was home to 70 people! Quiet enough drive down through Quorn and into Port Augusta and into the Big4 van park. Big is the word here! We are already getting a feeling that the adventure trail north will be chock-a-block with nose-to-tail vans...

Today we started by visiting Yourambulla Caves, the site of Aboriginal rock paintings. It's a fair old climb up the rocks and then there were the ladders! The paintings don't look anything like those we have been led to expect. They just looked like random marks with charcoal. Back up through the Flinders Range National Par, past Wilpena with a side trip to Stokes Hill lookout and then up to Binman, site of copper mining in days gone by. Took the scenic route through Glass Gorge back to the main road and a 'town' called Parachilna, didn't even see the horse, if it had one. Turned of the main road and went back through Brachina Gorge but this time from the west. The colours and light are so different every day, every corner you go around. The thing that strikes you most second time through is the width and size of the dry river bed you mostly drive on. Fabulous. Back at camp I wandered off to take some random snaps waiting for the sunset, which was brilliant yest...

Saturday 21 April – Flinders Ranges Oh my God or for you nerds -OMG- an amazing day. It was a lot cooler today around 23 degrees and overcast, so as far as I was concerned a good day for a walk. We started by driving the 50 kms to Wilpena to have a look at the must see Wilpena Pound. Picked up some useful maps from the Visitor’s info centre, packed our water and trail bars and off we went for an 8 km return walk to the Hill’s Homestead and Wangara Lookout which gives a panoramic view over the pound itself from the east wall. A lovely walk through giant river gums, past lagoons until we reached the old homestead built in the late 1800s and is still in good condition. Well we just had to push on to Wangara Lookout and even though it is only another kilometre on from the homestead it is all uphill! Brian said it was similar terrain to Mt Tennant with us walking on very large sloping rocks to reach the top. I might have been a tad slower than Brian could have been, but I made it. WOO H...

Friday 20 April Burra to Hawker We pulled out of Burra around 10ish as we had a fairly short journey today to Hawker. Stopped in Peterborough for fuel and decided to have a look through the visitor’s centre as it was in a first class sleeping carriage of an old train. The lady there told us there was a really good steam train museum just down the road, so of course we had to stop in for a look see. We spent the next hour and a half on a tour of the old railway works yard where there were the three different rail gauges that were in use by three different states at the one time. Seems pretty strange that the governments couldn’t agree on just one national gauge but I guess that’s governments for you. There was a very extensive variety of locomotives and various carriages including remote health carriages where nurses used to travel to different locations for a week or so to tend to the children of the area, workers accommodation carriages, breakdown carriages and an amazing rest...

Thursday 19 April – Mildura to Burra A pretty easy trip across to the SA border. We knew there were quarantine restrictions crossing the border, so I didn’t buy any fruit when I went shopping yesterday to replenish all my vegetables. Being on the ball we ate our last mandarins just before the border. What we didn’t know was there was a manned quarantine station and it wasn’t just fruit that was restricted. I had to hand over my just bought potatoes, pumpkin, sweet potato, lettuce, onions, tomatoes etc, etc. Oh well! We continued on down the A32 towards Adelaide when our turn off to Burra appeared. This was it, the real beginning of our adventure. We had never travelled on this road before or any road from now until July. Woo Hoo We turned off the highway that was travelling through pretty barren country to a delightful little oasis that is the town of Burra. Set amongst rolling hills it is a heritage village from the 1800s when copper and then gold mining was the way of life....

Monday 16 April –Echuca to Mildura Seemed like a never ending trip today. Had a quick stop for a piece of fruit in Swan Hill and then stopped beside the Murray at Boundary Bend for lunch. Finally arrived in Mildura a little hot and bothered. After we set up our site, we dipped our toes in the swimming pool at the park and it was just a tad too cold to stay in for a swim. Deciding we would really like a swim, we wandered off to the Mildura Aquatic Centre and did a few laps. Felt good. Decided that champagne and nibbles would go down well, we stopped via the bottle shop at the Grand Hotel and headed back to the Caravan Park for the night. Tuesday 17 April - Mildura An early start as we were booked on a tour to Mungo National Park. The mini bus arrived around 8.15 with our indigenous guide, driver and caterer all rolled into one, Graeme and off we went to pick up another 5 people at various accommodation houses. 16 kms of bitumen and then we hit the dusty, bumpy, silty corru...