I'm back from my ouback adventure now, sleeping outside was awesome apart from one thing....
26/8
Up at 5.15 this morning to be sorted and ready for pick up at 6.30. I then had the delight of another 12 hours on a bus. Managed to get some sleep to make up for the lack the night before. We had a nice lunch of chicken, salad and fruit at a "service station" in the middle of nowhere. We got to Coober Pedy at 6.35pm. The driver took us to a bottle shop (as they call them here) as drink is really expensive in Ayers Rock. Coober Pedy is an opal mining town and because of the temperatures there in the summer upwards of 50 degrees they say, alot of the town is build underground and into hills. We stayed in a cave for the night, which was cool-literally! We had dinner at a pizza bar and then came back to the cave for a few beers before heading off to an underground bar. Sounds cool, underground bar but it was underground so nothing attached to it like oh a dodgy underground thing. Anyway, me and Miriam (from Ireland) played some table football with the two Itlalians on tour, Claudia and Pierro. We then tried our hand at air hockey, wow what a painful game, neither of us could score for ages, the game timed out rather than one of us winning! Came back to the cave for a night sleep.
27/8
We got up at 7 to be ready for 8 this morning, only to find that the place we were going for the opal mine tour was just across the car park- he got us all in the van and then just did a lap of the carpark! On the tour we watched how they cut opals and then were shown around an underground house. They have everything that a normal house has only that windows are only at the front of the house because of it being cut out in a hill. We then waited and waited around for the other bus. Our tour group was joining up with another one that had started their tour a day earlier than we had. Finally their others arrived and we went on a tour of Coober Pedy.... is about all I can say about that!! The others then went on the tour that we had got up really early for, so you can imagine we were a little annoyed at getting up early for no reason! Those of us who had been on the opal tour in the morning then went noodling for opals, no luck there and then came back for a kick around as Miriam had brought a football to keep us amused for a bit. We had dinner at the pizza bar again and then headed to the underground bar. The other tour group hadn't slept underground so the whole evening for us was just a repeat of yesterday as the new people hadn't done any of it. It wasn't that bad though.
28/8
We left Coober Pedy early and headed for Ayers Rock. Caught up with some sleep on the way. We arrived at camp at about 6pm. We made our way over to a lookout near camp to watch the sunset over Ayers Rock and another rock formation called the Olgas which from afar actually looks like Homer Simpson laying down! There was a lot of cloud so the sunset wasn't as good as it could have been. Back to camp and a stir fry for dinner. We were all getting ready for bed, swag bags all laid out around the fire and then, oh my god, a huntsman spider decided to run through camp!!!!! It was not pleasant, the fire cast a shadow of it making it look even bigger. It ran off only to come back a bit later and run under the swag bag of the girl next to me then it went over to our pile of bags. Before bed, had to spend ages shaking out my swag bag just in case another one had got in!
29/8
Up at 5am and we headed off to "sunrise boulevard". Luckily enough of the cloud cover held off. It was really cool when the sun came up and lit the rock up orange. We had pancakes for breakfast while watching sunrise. We then did the walk around the base. Got back 45mins before some people in our group. The sun was out for most of the walk which was nice. To an hour and three quarters to walk it. We then had a look at the Cultural Centre, had burgers for lunch and then headed back to camp for a snooze in the afternoon before going back to the rock for sunset. Bit nippy in the evening. Sausages and steak on the bbq for dinner- bit of a meat overload!
30/8
This morning we got up for sunrise but it was cloudy so that was a waste of time. We had a walk at the Olgas today, it was ok. Really cold though, so much for it being hot in the desert. It rained and was windy also. There was some nice scenery around. Back to camp in the afternoon to back up before heading off to Kings Creek Station to set up camp for tonight. It was still really cold when we got there so we all sat really close to the fire but then our faces were just too hot, can't win!
31/8
Today we had a bit of a lay-in, 6.30am! We headed over to Kings canyon. It was about a 2 hour walk that we did. It was a better walk than yesterday. We saw the Garden of Eden in the canyon. Back to camp for lunch (reheated spag bol from yesterday) and then we hit the road for Alice Springs. We had a bit of 4wd action on the way which shaved 2 hours off the drive time. One of the swags fell off the roof in the process which was amusing. We all went out for dinner in the evening and then to Bojangles for some drinks. I left at 2.30am and turns out some of the others went back to the bus for a bus party that didn't finish until half 4ish!
So that was my outback adventure!
xx
