The Outback

Wow. Where do I begin? I have to much to say and reflect on since my last rambling, and it seems a bit daunting to sit here and try to put it into words right now. But, you know me...I'm always willing to give it a try! ;-)

When last we left off on our little tail of two American kids trudging through Oz, we were in Alice Springs, getting ready for our adventure into the Outback. And, I can give you the short version now...it was definitely an adventure!

After we repacked our bags and put our main luggage in storage at the hostel, we set off for one last meal in Alice. We found ourselves at a little place called Bojangles, where we found that they like to serve everything with fries in central Australia, including lasagna. After enjoying their chocolate indulgence dessert, we headed back for one last night in a bed before swag-time!

At 6 a.m., we waited patiently (with a few other folks from the hostel) for our tour buses to arrive. It turned out, we were the only ones on our bus from our hostel. Six a.m. in Australia this time of year is still quite dark, given that the sun doesn't rise until closer to 7:20, so we stood in the dark, quietly anticipating what the next three days would be like. Our bus showed up, and out popped Justine, our guide for the trip. We threw our bags in the camper, and grabbed some seats. There were only three people on the bus at that point. One was a girl from Jersey by the name of Jen. Phip - she's a Rutgers student, and almost immediately, I could see you rolling your eyes at her. The other girl was Rachel, who is finishing up her gap year and headed back to the UK to start University in the fall. The third person was Erica, another Adventure Tours guide who had been in Tasmania guiding and was getting a refresher on the Alice tours before getting back in the swing of things.

As the bus began to fill and we pulled out of Alice, Justine let us know that our goal was to make it to Uluru/Kata Tjuta National Park by lunch so that we could still do a hike through Kata Tjuta before catching the sunset over Uluru. So, we set off on our five hour drive. Soon into the journey, Justine had us all come to the front of the bus and introduce ourselves to our new "Outback family." I immediately thought of all of my Lancaster peeps (closer than my peeps you are to me) and our bus tour with Graeme through the Highlands. One by one, we all made our way to the front of the bus and explained who we were, where we were from, what we were doing in Australia and what our favorite move is. Our group had two Canadians, five Americans (including us), one Dutch, three Brits, one Czech, one Aussie and five Germans. We ranged from students on Gap year to wanderers on an adventure to parents/grandparents on holiday. Another successful cast for an MTV show!

So, we slowly made our way to the Red Centre. We made a couple of stops along the way to use the toilets, purchase snacks and see the largest echidna in captivity (a massive statue, but still awesome since we haven't seen a real one yet!) We save a large black eagle on the side of the road keeping a keen eye on some road kill. We also saw a pack of wild camels roaming in the bush. I had no idea that Australia was home to about one million wild camels. These animals were brought over years and years ago and have done remarkably well in central Oz. Now, the Middle East is looking to actually bring some camels from Australia because their own numbers aren't so high. Crazy!

One of the stops we made was to collect firewood. So, we pulled off the side of the road, and were all asked to go roaming through the bush to grab large pieces of wood. So, off we went. Along the way, I saw some animal tracks (probably kangaroo) in the red sand, and some animal dung that I'm not quite sure to what it belongs. The good news is I saw no snakes! Once we had brought the firewood to the bus, and Justine had strapped it to the roof of the camper, we were off again to our camp to have lunch.

Something I didn't mention about the tour to Kangaroo Island, which is also true of this tour, is that we are responsible for helping with meals. We chop and mix and barbie. Turns out, AJ and I are both quite good at this, which you'll hear more about later. So, we had our lunch (sandwiches) and then headed out to Kata Tjuta.

Kata Tjuta is a set of large rock formations that were formed over years and years ago (I'm terrible at historical numbers, so hopefully 'years and years' will be sufficient enough for you). Kata Tjuta is the Aboriginal name, but the first European explorerer that saw them called them The Olgas, named for the Spanish queen at the time. Now, it's official name is Kata Tjuta/The Olgas, since the land has recently (within the past twenty years) been given back to the Aboriginals. So, we drove to the base of Kata Tjuta and Justine let us know that during the winter, they typically only hike to the first lookout point because the days are shorter, but the second lookout point it much nicer, so if we were willing to go quickly, she would like us to get to the more rewarding spot. So, off we went. And by off we went, I mean...holy hell we were hoofing it! At first, I was feeling a little bitter because I didn't feel like I was seeing anything because I was too busy trying to find the right foot placing so I didn't fall down the rocks. My bitterness dwindled as I caught my breath and was able to snap a few pictures of the beautiful scenery. And when we were back to the bus (after practically running the 6 km trek), we headed to the sunset lookout point for Uluru.

Much like Kata Tjuta, Uluru has a European name of Ayer's Rock. Uluru is thought to be the world's largest monolith. Because of the iron build up in the sand, it is red, and during different times of the day, looks like different colors. At sunset, it absolutely glows red. It is amazing! So, we had a champagne toast, cheese and crackers as the sunset (and tons of pictures, of course) before heading back to camp for the night. And once that sunset, the cold seriously set in. But more on the nighttime adventures later!