We again woke early, had a leisurely breakfast (with a bird that I still haven't identified - see photo) and undertook two fun, but quite short walks (both about an hour in length) around Trephina gorge. We started with the "Panorama Walk" ("Grade: Difficult") which took us up the side of the cliff. The views were, as always, ........ amazing!
In the second photo you can see the gorge that we walked up from. We then undertook the "Trephina Gorge Walk" which was more dramatic. There were some impressive drops that I stood well back from whilst Joris and Christine sat on the edge!
We finished our walks by the early morning and, as we wanted to fit as much in as possible (this was our last full day), we drove back to Alice. We first stopped at the camel park (very interesting) and Christine and I got a ride around on a camel which had been caught in the wild.We finished back in Alice and checked in at the Toddy's backpackers! Joris and I then made a mistake. We told Christine that it would be a short walk up to the old Telegraph station and that it would be a fascinating experience. errr., the walk was about 5km (and Christine was only wearing flip-flops) along the dried up Todd river. Christine also didn't show a great deal of interest in telegraph poles and therefore this experience was probably not a highlight of her trip! Anyway, we then walked again for a long way (getting lost in the process) to find the Alice Springs school of the Air. Joris decided that he'd had enough of museums at this point and ran back (about 6km) to pick up the car whilst Christine and I looked at the school! Joris is either brave and kind, or completely mad! The school was interesting and brought back lots of happy memories of the Meekatharra school of the Air which I visited last year. Christine asked how you can become a teacher at the school - perhaps she really liked Alice!
About an hour later Joris turned up again in the car (good man!) and drove us back into the town. We spent much of the evening in the "Bojangles Saloon" where, if you had known, you could have watched us on their internet link and "shouted us some beers" (for next time). This was quite a saloon - I ate a medley of crocodile, emu, kangaroo, buffalo and camel, drank a lot of NT beer and chatted with a friendly waitress (who was from New Zealand, but spent all her life in Alice Springs - she had never been to Uluru). She was thinking of travelling to see some friends in a place called Toronto that she thought might be in Canada or Scotland. We talked about the Aboriginal population (none of whom were in the saloon - "we let the clean ones in"). In fact there were plenty of Aboriginal people around Alice, but none of them were working in the shops or chatting with the tourists. The only interaction we saw was a security guard throwing out an young Aboriginal man from the shopping centre. Otherwise .... they ignored us and we ignored them. It was strange.I'll probably write another blog entry later describing everything that I've forgotten. The last day was short. Christine went shopping while Joris and I went to the reptile park. Another wonderful museum. The lady giving out the tickets was from Shoreham-by-sea in South England (she was about my age and I wonder if we went to the same school). We saw heaps of lizards and snakes (and a large salt-water crocodile), but the highlight was having a 10kg python draped around my neck.
Then we flew home. Joris went off the Melbourne, Christine to Canberra and I took the train up to Epping. What a holiday!
5 comments:
What a holiday indeed! Well done, George. You wrote about every day of it, very much appreciated. THANKS.
Did you see much of the stars from out there, or was the moon too bright?
That's very odd (and inexplicable) about Christine and the telegraph poles. Given that her father used to be a telecommunications engineer, I would have expected that an opportunity to see a number of different telegraph pole designs would have been exciting for her. This may be more evidence against Lamarck's ideas of the inheritance of acquired characteristics.
Thank you George, for giving us this whole story! We went to Uluru by car, starting in Adelaide. We did not see all the same places as you did, but stll it was an amazing trip. Good that Joris could make this one before leaving Australia.
Greetings,
Myriam
Thanks for putting the pictures online and telling the world of our exploits, George.
As for the mistaken distance to the telegraph museum (along with any other losings of way): that was entirely and completely due to the bad map we had! (I wash my hands of it.)
The telegraph museum, by the way, was more a collection of old houses and local history than anything to do with telegraph poles and/or designs. I think the only real significance was that it was effectively the birth place of Alice Springs (the supposed "springs" -which turned out to be waterholes if anything- are right beside it). Beyond that, there are plenty of equally interesting similar museums all over Australia (and, therefore, reachable by public transport :-) )
And isn't camel riding just it's own special experience?!
Also, as a would-be Australian permanent resident, you're going to have to start using our colloquialisms, and translating where necessary for the international audience. Therefore the correct phrase is "... was only wearing thongs (flip-flops)". We Aussies acknowledge what "flip-flops" are, but dude, unAustralian! (though better than the kiwi equiv).
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