Apr 25-29 Alice Springs

We didn't plan to get to Alice Springs quite so quickly. On the final leg of the drive, we considered stopping at a couple of places, but decided to keep moving. We were influenced by a combination of road-side noise and the number of campers around. Being Easter Monday, there were no doubt more campers around than "normal".

We did the obligatory stop at the NT border and took the obligatory photo (of the obligatory dogs).

We stayed the first night in Alice in a caravan park close to where Ruby lives, and close to the main road in to Alice. An easy place to find for our first night. Not only was it a bit pricey, but we also felt a bit wedged in, between 2 permanent vans. Ruby had very kindly provided us with a list of dog-friendly caravan parks around Alice Springs, so we checked them out on our first morning. We found a cheap and cheerful park (well its actually more aptly described as "rough and ready") about 10km out of town. Not that we wanted to be that far away from Ruby, but we now have more room for us and the dogs, and we have lovely views around us. We have a rocky cliff on one side of us and a dry (but lush green) creek on the other. The people in this park are much more friendly as well. We have booked for a week and so far it has been very pleasant and relaxing.

Our camp site at Temple Bar Caravan Park

One of the resident eagles at the top of the rocky cliff

Views of a dry river bed on the other side - note how unusually green it is!

The driveway into the caravan park

Ruby has been working evenings and starts at 3pm. So we get to see her in the mornings, which is nice. And then we just take it easy in the afternoons. She has a few days off from Sunday so we'll plan to do something special then.

So far, we've been taking it pretty easy in Alice. Cleaned the car, which took most of one day. Another day (or major part thereof) was consumed because of a bad smell that was emanating from the car's internal fan. For many days now, every time we used the air conditioner or any fan speed, the cabin would fill with the shocking odour of a dead animal. As we are planning to go further north to hotter climates, it was necessary to investigate and fix this problem. After pulling apart much of the front dashboard of the car - far more than was actually required but I don't usually do this sort of thing - I found the culprit. It was a cute little mouse, firmly wedged into the blades of the fan rotor. We're very glad to have that fixed now.

The unwelcome extra passenger hiding in our car fan

A clearer picture of the smelly little bugger

Ruby won't like it, but here's a picture quiz for anyone who's interested. We call the following photo "the Oreo".

Guess which arm belongs to who?
But who has been in Alice Springs the longest?

Apr 25 Alice Springs

We made it! We arrived in Alice Springs - ahead of schedule. We met up with Ruby and had a lovely dinner at the famous Bo Jangles, where we also celebrated Jude's birthday.

More updates from Alice coming soon...

Apr 24 Coober Pedy to Marla



Morning view from Hutchison's Monument camp site

We went to see the infamous town of Coober Pedy with mixed expectations. A few people had given us their brief perceptions of the town prior to our visit, but we wanted to keep an open mind. Coober Pedy is an interesting town and a town that is almost unavoidable when one travels from Port Augusta to Alice Springs. We filled up with petrol, topped up with a few supplies from the supermarket, visited an underground opal mine/jewellery shop and I spent an hour or so noodling for opal in the public dirt pit. (Noodling is the term used for someone wasting their time digging through the mullock heap that someone else has dug out of the ground and removed any sign of opal from it. Apparently it originated from the word nodule, that is looking for opal nodules in the rocks.)

We could have gone on any of dozens of mine tours being spruiked, but our cynical take on these were that such tours are offered by the unlucky miners - found no opal, but have a hole in the ground to show tourists who are silly enough to pay them money to see it. If you found significant opal in this town, I don't think you would persevere with your residency in order to spend your spoils locally. It is an untidy town, which is reference to the people who live there as much as the landscape. The climate can be very inhospitable, but fortunately for us, this time of year it is actually very pleasant. Except for the flies - did I mention the flies yet! They were absolutely shocking. Check out the pics below.

The town of Coober Pedy

More views of Coober Pedy

Unbeknownst to me, while I was (unsuccessfully) noodling for opal, Jude was plotting her escape. We agreed to drive on, and set our destination as a campsite at Marla - a lovely sounding picnic site at Marla Bore, 14 km beyond the roadhouse (which is effectively the town). On the way out of Coober Pedy, we detoured to see the Breakaways - an outcrop of interesting rocks. This was worth the 12km drive down a dirt track to see.

We drove for a few more hours and found what we thought was the turn-off to the Marla bore. Sure enough it was a dirt road, as described. This dirt road however, was quite rough and heavily corrugated. Towing a van along such a road is not pleasant and 10km can seem like a significant journey. Much to our disappointment, there was no camp site. We drove a bit further - still nothing. So, back we went to the town (roadhouse), asked a local kid for information and were told that the camp facilities (toilets) had been moved "just down that other dirt track" and "turn onto another road when you see the wind sock". Well, we tried to follow his instructions but didn't see any wind sock. This dirt road could be more aptly described as a sand road. No bumps - that's good. But no traction either. Having been bogged once already on this trip, I'm more cautious now about maintaining the ability to drive robustly on all 4 wheels. We went on for the 10kms that was purportedly where the camp site should have been located. Again nothing. We went on a bit further just in case. Still nothing. But now what to do? This sand road was barely the width of 2 cars,  and in some places narrowed to the width or barely one caravan. That was OK, because we didn't see any other traffic on this road. But the sides of the road were banked with several feet of sand. Driving along the road gave one the impression of being on a bob-sled track. Great if you are going straight ahead. Not so great if you want to turn around. It was dusk now and getting dark quite quickly. We drove further along this banked sand track into the dark outback searching for some side opening where we might possibly turn around. It seemed like an impossibly long time that we drove further and further along this track with no prospect of turning around. I tried once to manoeuvre the car and van optimistically, but failed miserably. We drove for a further 10km along this god-forsaken track until there was a small ill-defined track turning off towards another end of the earth. At high revs and high speed, we just managed to drive the car and van into the track, over the sandy curb, through some rough scrub and back onto the "main" road. It was now black night, we were 20+km displaced in the outback and just wanted to get back to the highway. We sped back at speeds of up to 60km along the sandy track and fortunately again did not encounter any other traffic. What a relief to finally make it back to the main highway! We were happy to set up camp for the night at the back of the roadhouse, even if it did cost us $25 for the night. And even if we had neighbours who were barely 5 feet away from us.

Sorry, no photos of the sandy track - too dark and too stressful. But here are some shots of the aftermath of the orange dust on the car and van.

Apr 23 Coober Pedy

We set off for the relatively long drive from Woomera to Coober Pedy - about 400km or about 5 hours of driving for us. More desolate landscapes for miles on either side of us for most of the trip. A couple of exciting breaks in the monotony was the surprise vista of a salt lake. Unlike the famous Lake Eyre, which is uncommonly full of water currently, these lakes (e.g. Lake Hart) were just dry salt plains. But a quick glance from certain angles and you could have convinced yourself that you were at the beach - even if only Grantville at low tide.

The "beach" at Lake Hart

The Ghan railway line next to the lake

We found a free-camp site 12km south of Coober Pedy at Hutchison's monument. (Will Hutchison was a 14 year old boy who first discovered opals at Coober Pedy.) Nearly missed it; in fact we drove past and had to u-turn on the highway to get back to it. But it was worth it. Behind the monument was an open area that extended well back from the road (and more importantly, the road noise). We arrived with only one other camper with which to share this lovely place. After dusk, 2 more camping parties pulled into the site. We were a bit disappointed - they seemed to park so close to us. Can't they spread out and give us space. In any case we slept very well and woke yet another day to splendid views from the caravan window. We also realised that our invading fellow campers from the previous evening weren't that close after all. The closest was about 50 metres away from us. We didn't realise how lucky we were to be in such a perfect camp site. But we would soon be jolted by the contrast of the close confines of the dreaded "caravan park".

Hutchison's Monument camp site

The beautiful dessert sunset