OUTBACK tour

Blog voor mama

The rock tour – NT tourism – famil

First day

I took the plane at 9:35 from Melbourne to Alice Springs. When we arrived in Alice there was the tour guide of the rock tour waiting for us, called ‘Wookie’. The weather was really nice, not too warm not too hot. Quit a few flies… but it was alright.

Drove to the hostel – YHA and checked in to our hostel. 4pax rooms with 3 girls. The hostel was pretty nice. Big kind of garden, a living room, kitchen (all clean!) and good Wi-Fi. Then we drove to the rock bar where we met the rest of the group. I think 90% English, 10% Australian and then me group of 13 people. We had an delicious lunch, ate kangaroo for the first time in my life! After lunch we drove to an reptile centre. Big snakes, a crocodile and other reptiles. Pretty cool! But what I liked the most was the guide there who told us his stories so passionate. Handles his 3.5m crocodile as it was his dog. Repeated his story like 3 times, so everyone will remember him! Snakes are not dangerous, crocodiles will kill you. They won’t eat you, just kill you! (By drowning you and maybe eat your leg, but nothing more because his stomach is too small.

Then we drove to the first communication station between Australia and London, bit boring, had a guide who told us the history and showed us around. Drove to Anzac hill, with a nice view. And then back to the hostel. At 7:30 we went to a restaurant and again delicious food! Pizza, and a dip platter. After dinner we went to a bar, and I went home.. my ‘baarmoeder’ was killing me. Bought some aspirins on the way back.

Alice Springs, was a nice little town, lots of aboriginal people, standard shops like > target, woolwarts. YHA hostel was a nice hostel! And Montes the restaurant is a real recommendation. Looks awesome and the food is good.

Second day

Now we are in the bus for 2.5 hours. Lookie gave us an assignment > write your name on the window of the bus + a drawing of your home country. So what are you going to draw if you are the worst in drawing… and come from the Netherlands. I went for a windmill. Then we had to come in front of the bus to introduce yourself and answer a few questions. > what’s your name, where do you come from, where do you work, what’s your favourite animal, what kind of superpower would you like to have, when was your first kiss, and when was your last kiss..

After the 2.5h bus drive we arrived at kings creek station. Went on an awesome aboriginal tour. 2 real aboriginals learned us everything about their culture. How they hunt, like what kind of spears. How they live, what the difference is in what boys do and what girls do, what they eat, like all the different plants and seeds. Also a ‘rups’ which lives in the inside the tree. And we were all shocked when she actually took 4 out of a tree. Kept them and cooked them later on for us…. They said it would taste like scrambled eggs. And I wanted to be brave and taste it.. so I ate one… actually not that bad, bit like scrambled eggs, but the idea of eating it was awful! At the end they let us smell kind of plants and showed healing ceremonies etc. really interesting!  Then we went for dinner, delicious steak. After dinner we arrived at our camp! Sleeping in swags… which is a kind if matrass where you crawl in to, take your sleeping bag in there and then just sleep in the open air. It was a cool experience, but also kind of scary… all those insects who could jump on my face… and in that area where a lot of dingo’s (wild dogs) ! I saw one near the camp, pretty cool, but not when you are sleeping outside. Sad thing is that the rain had to ruin our outside experience, and after 2 hours outside we went inside of a tent because the swags are not water proof. Slept for like 3 hours…

Day 3

And then woke up at 5:30 to have a quick breakfast and then start the walk to kings canyon! It was a 3 hour work, 6km. Up to the canyon and then around it. Having amazing views, look down from above, walked down to a ‘garden’ with a lake. And then back up by climbing the stairs. It was a hard walk! With climbing the hills, go back down, go back up etc. but I did it! And it was amazing! And because I was kind of scared the days before that it would be too hard, it was alright! Better prepare for the worst.

Drove down to almost Uluru, stopped for lunch > wraps with salad etc. > self-made. And then drove to our resort. The resort had little houses and then divided in 4 rooms. Every room has his own entrance. I sleep in a 4pax dorm, bunkbeds. It’s a small room but pretty good! Nice and clean. We had a shower and then got dressed for the camel cup! Which is an event that is once a year. And its camel racing. We were in a VIP area, with free drinks, private bar etc. super cool to see the camels racing and being as a VIP! A view people of our group went for a helicopter flight – 65$ for 5 minute flight over Uluru. They thought it was amazing. After the race we went back to the resort for dinner, again our own table, own area with lots of food and drinks. Including emu, camel and kangaroo. After dinner we went back to the camel cup area where the after party was. VIP area, everyone dressed up, life band. Pretty cool to experience. Being part of the locals.

Day 4

We had to be ready at 8:45. Almost everyone was really hang over but I felt fine! We drove to the valley of the wind to have a walk 3.5 hour walk of 7.4 km. Going up and down again, but not as high as the canyon. This was way different. A valley of 36 very big rocks. 2m shorter than Uluru. The tour guide told a lot about how they got here, the area, the plants, very interesting. The walk was really nice, the paths where not that steady.. little rocks everywhere. Unfortunately I bought new shoes before I went on the tour, and with all these walks I have bladders everywhere. Under my foot, on my toes, on the back of my foot, at the it was really hard to walk >  but I made it! After the walk we had a self-made lunch again. One thing what is really bad in the outback are all the flies. That’s why during the day you can where a flie-net which is super handy. During lunch they come to all the food so you have to be care full you don’t eat one. After lunch we drove to the high light of the red center – Uluru. They have a cultural centre there where you can learn everything about the rock and the aboriginals. Why the rock is so important for them, and why they don’t want people to climb it. Its part of their culture and not meant to be climbed or a tourist attraction. We went to the carpark to start the ‘malu walk’ along Uluru the tour guide told us we could walk bear feet because the path would be of sand. Worst decision ever, because it wasn’t sand it was all little stones. So painful that he saw me suffering and offered him his shoes. During the walk he told us a lot about the aboriginals. We walked along the rock and found paintings from the aboriginals. The part where they teaches children what the drawings mean, the woman area, the men’s area, the elderly area and he explained what they did there and what the drawing mean. Really interesting.

After the walk we went to a spot where we could see sunset and uluru. Because the rock changes colour when the sun goes down, every 5 minutes. If im being honest I didn’t see it. But the sunset was so beautiful. During sunset Lookie cooked us dinner > pasta, noodles, chicken and vegetables and we drink a glass of champagne.

We drove back to the resort at 6:30 and had to make ourselves ready > having a shower, get all the red dirt of yourself.. to catch the bus at 7:20 to the field of lights. It’s an exposition of I don’t know how many lights shining on solar power and it was stunning. We walked through it and enjoyed the ‘field of lights’.

Day 5

Got up at 6am to see the sunrise at the same spot we went for sunset.

Got in to the town of ayers rock – yulara, bought some postcards.

Went to the airport to fly from Yulara to Sydney to Brisbane. Left at 13:50, arrive at 21:30