The Red Centre

The Red Centre is not quite what I had expected, flat and barron with little to see but mile of road with a big, very big rock off in the distance.  Instead, the Macdonnell Range goes right through Alice Springs and the area around it is quite hilly, mountainous really, with many National Parks full of gorges, trees and has lots on great walking trails.

We visited the East MacDonnell range first when we arrived at Alice Springs, spending a couple nights at Trephina Gorge NP, at the Bluff campsite, surrounded by red cliffs.  What great NP campsites, $3.30 p/p and the campsite contains toilets, water and a propane barbeque all located in a beautiful location.

200 km south and 250 km west of Alice Spring is Uluru, also known as Ayers Rock and what can you say about such magnificent sight.  We arrived at Uluru at sunset and we were not disappointed by the grand display of literally glowing rock.  The next day we were up early to see the sunrise on Uluru and did a walk around the rock and also visited Kata Tjuta, also known as Mt Olga, which we found just as nice if not better than Uluru.  

Just a quick 200 km drive north and east from Uluru is Watarrka NP and Kings Canyon...we were so glad we took the day to drive up and do what we are classifying as one of our favourite hikes yet (7 km of amazing scenery, huge cliffs and hills of sandstone).  A long way to go for a walk but..wow.

After three days in the parks it was back to Alice Springs to visit with Jeff and Sharyn (friends we met at Cradle Mt, in Tasmania), a sleep in a real bed and homemade pizza!!!  Yum.  They also gave us a few good tips on some more sights to see in the area and to top it all off they treated us to a day 4x4ing to Palm Valley in the Finke Gorge NP,  Ken was more than happy to sit in the back of their Toyota Prado and look at the sights.  What a great time we had in Alice! 

What a great time we had at the Red Centre of Australia!

The Trephina Gorge, not a drop of water to be found but the cuts in the rock are proof that sometimes there is.

The white bark of the The Ghost Gum at Trephina NP stands out beautifully against the blue of the big sky.

Uluru at sunset, the orange rock glowed as the skies lost the light of day.

Uluru at miday, not quite the show as the night before but still pretty impressive.

A few people were climbing Uluru, but we had chosen to do the 11 km walk around it instead.  The native people ask that you don't climb the rock because it is a sacred place to them.

 Kata Tjuta, also a very impressive sight as we approached in the late afternoon.

Ya, the flies were bad at Tata Tyuta...flynets are in fashion here.

The hike into the Karingana Lookout at Tata Tyuta was even more impressive than the one around Uluru.

The cliffs of Kings Canyon hang in the background. They have a sheer smooth drop which looks like butter (or maybe chocolate) cut through with a hot knife.

Around the cliffs of the Kings Canyon, rolling hills of sandstone are reminiscent of sand dunes they once were, a long, long time ago.

There was rain in Alice Springs a week or two before (yeh!) we got there but the fire danger was still high...at least it was not catastrophic. 

Due to the past rain, flowers covered the desert floor as well as a lot of the trees...and everything looked so green!

Jeffs homemade pizza :)  Not much left.  We tried an Aussie pizza...lots of ham and topped with an egg or two.  Good, really!

The Ochre Pits in West MacDonnell NP.  The Aboriginals used this rock, ground fine and mixed with water, to make a paint for their skin in ceremonies, wall art and for trading.

The flowers of the waddle bush are out in full force after the rain in the past weeks.

Sharyn, Jeff, Me and Ken sit on the ledge of Palm Valley.  Red rock, blue sky, hats and lots of sunscreen.

The Finke Gorge, accessible only by 4x4.  White Lightning had to stay home for the day.

Palm Valley, who would think that a valley filled with palm trees would be in the middle of the outback, surrounded by desert.