After many, many years of waiting, it was finally time for Eileen‘s visit Down Under. After a few days of exploring Sydney, the Snook and I set off with her for Australia’s red centre. Qantas fly direct to Alice Springs, but it worked out much cheaper to fly Jetstar to Adelaide, get a hotel for the night, and then fly Tiger to Alice Springs. So off we flew to Adelaide…

Our hotel in Adelaide was the Country Comfort, which – to our surprise – turned out to be a motel. Huh. It was serviceable, if a little run-down. We headed off on a walking tour of the city. Rundle Mall is the main shopping district, and that’s where we found the “Mall’s Balls.” It’s a famous sculpture of two silver balls on end. Here we are pulling faces in the reflection.

We were advised by several folks on Twitter to check out the Botanic Gardens. It was a cool and rainy day, but we still had a good time looking at the flowers and exhibits. Here’s the Snook looking at some massive Amazon water lilies.

One one point it started pouring, so we took shelter under this tree while we planned our next move.

Of course, we decided to go to the pub. Here we are in Hindley Street, sharing a pint.

We next hiked up to Light’s Vision, a lookout above the city. Here’s a self-portrait of me walking past the Adelaide Cricket Oval.

The next day we caught our flight to Alice Springs. We were gratified by the sunshine and warmth after the cold and rain of Sydney and Adelaide. The airport is small, and we ended up waiting quite a bit for a taxi. Eventually we made it to our accommodation, the Heavitree Outback Lodge. It was PERFECT. Just what you imagine an outback lodge to be. Here’s another self-portrait of me with the view outside our room’s patio. Look at that sky!

We immediately checked out the Heavitree Gap tavern. It was pretty rough. We repaired ot the “beer garden” (aka a couple tables outside).

We caught a shuttle to town and hiked to the top of ANZAC Hill, a lookout over the city. Here’s me and the Snook.

We decided to go tourist-y for dinner, so we headed to Bo’s Saloon. It was pretty fun. Snookums and Eileen shared the “Outback Mixed Grill,” which included emu, camel, buffalo, kangaroo, and crocodile. Very exciting!

Back at our hotel, we discovered several black-footed wallabies in the parking lot eating out of guests’ hands. They were so cute! One of them had a joey in its pouch.

We headed straight to bed, as we had a very early wake-up call the next day…

We were booked in for the 3-day tour with Wayoutback Desert Safaris, and they picked us up at 6am. After a quick stop at the office to sign in, we headed out on the Stuart Highway towards Uluru. Here’s me trying to wake-up. We saw a dingo along the road!

We made several stops throughout the morning, including a camel farm! Here’s me and Eileen having a quick camel ride around the yard. (Cost was $5 and well worth it!)

Another stop was the Mount Ebenezer Roadhouse. Here’s Eileen and the Snook. There were a dozen trekkers on the safari in total, along with our two guides. The group was a great mix: us three, a Melbourne couple, a young Australian couple, a Sydney-based Chinese mom and her 12yo son, a young English guy studing medicine, a young English girl (whose parents kept crossing our path on their luxury tour), and a Swedish female engineer who works on oil rigs in the North Sea.

Our senior guide Mike tricked us with Mount Connor. We all thought it was Uluru! But it’s not. We stopped off at a lookout to take a few pictures.

Snookums playing in the red dirt. Our shoes and socks were getting dusty.

A close-up of the red dirt!

Self-portrait of me with Mount Connor (and Eileen in the background).

Adventurer Eileen points the way!

Snookums with a nearby salt lake. (It’s near Lake Amadeus.)

After about six hours of travelling, we finally saw a very familiar shape in the distance. It was Uluru. We had lunch and then headed to the park…

Most of our group decided against climbing Uluru. (It’s still allowed, but the Aboriginal custodians discourage it.) So several of us decided to do the base walk, a flat track nearly 6 miles (10km) around the outside of it. Here’s the Snook and I heading off. I just couldn’t get over the blue of the sky against the red of the rock.

Aboriginal cave paintings from the base of Uluru.

Here’s a cave at the base of Uluru. There were many places – this isn’t one – that were marked as sacred and you weren’t supposed to take pictures. Interestingly, it wasn’t really enforced. We only saw one more person on the track, so it was really up to your own conscience.

Snookums and Uluru.

Eileen and Uluru.

We were advised to bring flynets (along with hats and sunscreen and insect repellent). The flies got pretty bad on the walk, so Eileen experimented with her net. We mostly decided they were more annoying than useful though. But those flies SUCKED.

The funny thing is that Uluru isn’t smooth all around. Many of the faces on the back side – which isn’t the one in the postcards – have large chunks missing and interesting crevices and caves. Here’s the Snook contemplating a big opening.

One of the most surprising things to me was how GREEN it was around Alice and Uluru. There were some lovely trees that provided shade around the base of Uluru.

The walk took us about two hours to finish it, and we were all pretty hot and sweaty and uncomfortable at the end. The group met up and headed to the sunset viewing area to watch the colours change as the sun went down.

We had champagne and nibblies and watched the sun set. It was amazing. Eileen took this picture of me and the Snook.

Most of us were surprised to learn that the Olgas (aka Kata Tjuta) were visible from Uluru. You can see them as the bumps towards the center of this sunset picture.

After sunset, we headed to our campsite at Yulara, the small “township” nearby. (It was really just hotels and campsites.) We started a campfire and cooked kangaroo bolognese before settling down in our swags for the night. (A swag is a heavy canvas bag with a thin mattress inside. You put your sleeping bag inside and it protects you from the dirt and the elements.) Quite frankly, sleeping on the dirt was my biggest worry about the trip. It was perfectly comfortable, but I never sleep well in strange places. I did toss and turn a fair bit. However, I’m happy to report that our campground had shared toilets and showers, so my “peeing behind a bush” fears weren’t realised.

We got up super early the next morning – like 4am early – and had a quick breakfast before packing up the camp. Then we headed back to Uluru to watch the sun rise on the rock. Here’s me and the Snook, still waking up.

And here’s Eileen. You can see how much the colours have changed just in the few minutes between photos.

Some of our group climbed up on the truck to get a better view. (Seriously! Look at that sky!)

A group shot. We really had perfect weather for the trip. The nights and mornings were chilly, but the days were hot without being stifling. We even got a cool breeze at times.

Then we were off to the Olgas. This amazing structure of more than 30 rock domes dominates the landscape. (The big dome is even higher than Uluru!) We first went to a viewing platform to see them in context.

The Olgas were stunning.

We then set off on the challenging three hour “Valley of the Winds” hike. This walk took us up, around, and between several of the domes at the Olgas. We stopped at several points for our guide Mike to tell us about the geology and wildlife. Here’s Rodd and some of our group.

Eileen and some more of our group. We each were instructed to carry at least 1.5 liters of water with us on the walk.

Snookums and I at some point along the hike.

Eileen being pensive at the natural beauty around her.

Eileen and Snookums on the trail ahead of me. This was one of the easier bits, but even then we had a steepish grade and loose gravel to contend with.

Self-portrait of me along the walk.

This was the trickiest section of the walk by far. At first I couldn’t even see a path, just a solid wall up the middle of two domes. It was incredibly steep and rocky. (There’s no way you’d have something like this in the U.S. without guiderails or safety features!)

Here’s the Snook and I, very relieved to have made it to the top.

Together with Eileen at the top. Getting down was nearly as bad as going up!

Self-portrait with the Snook.

The Snook was the first to notice that the geology of the Olgas is very different from Uluru. Where Uluru is pretty much a solid lump of sandstone, the Olgas are a conglomerate made of lots of stuck-together rocks.

After the hike, we had lunch at the Uluru Cultural Center. Then we headed off towards our campsite for the night. Along the way we stopped at the salt lake for a closer look. I got romantic.

Self-portait with salt lake. Just to be clear, there wasn’t any standing water. The thin salt crust cracked and gave way to some evil black mud though, which was the only visible moisture.

Our campsite for the night was Kings Creek cattle station. Wayoutback is the only tour group allowed to camp in isolated spots away within the station itself. The toilet and shower were completely open to the world (albeit faced away from the camp). I was gratified to see at least it was a real toilet. (The Snook and I immediately dubbed it the “epiphany toilet” from Scrubs.) The shower boiler had to be stoked with an actual fire. It was pretty amazing to stand naked in the outback and shower under a starry sky.

I’ll be honest with you: this was an AWFUL night’s sleep for me. Again, the swag was perfectly comfortable. The stillness and starry sky (with shooting stars!) were awe-inspiring. I just couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned all night. I felt a bit like a zombie as we had breakfast and packed up the camp.

Snookums having his breakfast. This campsite had a dining area under cover. (For our dinner on the 2nd night, we had chicken stir fry and damper cooked on the fire. It was great. Most of the cooking was done by Eileen and the Melbourne lady, Marie-Cris, since they seemed the most organised and capable.)

Our third day featured another three hour walk, this one through Kings Canyon. Here’s our guide Mike giving us a lecture on staying hydrated. You can see on the sign behind him that the temperature thankfully wasn’t too bad.

This walk was billed as being as challenging as the one at the Olgas, but for the most part I felt it was easier. The path was well marked and we didn’t have all the dangerous loose gravel to contend with. The worst bit was right at the beginning, when we had to climb basically an enormous stone staircase straight up a cliff face.

Snookums posing manfully at the halfway point in the climb. Thankfully there were a couple platforms where you could stop and catch your breath. We were actually pretty high above the ground at this point.

Eileen in Kings Canyon. The hike was mostly up high on the cliffs and walls surrounding the canyon.

Yet another self-portrait.

A shot of some of our group at one of the rest stops.

Snookums and guide Mike talk under a tree.

Me on a really high cliff. Mike warned us not to get too close to the edge. (But still no guard rails!)

Snookums and I together, squinting in the bright sun.

The top of these canyon walls was like being on the moon. I’m having a rest here, and you can see my dusty boots. We were all pretty dirty by this point in the trip.

Snookums wondering how the heck we’re ever going to get all the red dust out of our clothes.

At one point in the hike, we actually climbed down into the canyon itself to go to the “Garden of Eden.” This lush area was full of ancient cycads, trees, and songbirds.

Yet another self-portrait with the Snook.

We stopped for snacks at this amazing water hole in the Garden of Eden. Sometimes groups get to swim in it, but the water was too low for us to do it.

We all posed together on a rock ledge.

Another group shot.

One last shot into that amazing sandstone canyon.

After Kings Canyon it was time to head home. We made a few stops for lunch and toilet along the way, and at one point we begged Mike to take us off-road a bit. He obliged… and of course we got bogged. Even with the 4wd engaged, we just couldn’t move. We all piled out to help. We dug out the wheels, laid down sticks and brush for traction, and laid a metal ramp under the most sunken wheel. Then Mike floored it. We got out!

We made one final stop along the road for a group shot at sunset. Then it was back to Alice Springs for a quick shower before we all met up for dinner and beers at Bo’s Saloon. Thanks so much to Mike, Carl, Andy, Ully, Caroline, Mari-Cris, Heath, James, Emily, Sofia, and Jackie for making the trip so memorable!

The three of us spent the next morning relaxing by the pool at the Heavitree Gap before heading out to the airport for our flight to Adelaide. Steph‘s dad Ian gave us a great recommendation for dinner: Beyond Adelaide. It was nice to be back in the city! (At least for me; I think the Snook prefers the bush.) We spent the night at the Adelaide Paringa, which was clean and well-appointed (and very centrally located). On our final morning, we caught the plane back to Sydney. It was a short but very exciting trip!