29 Jul 10 - Alice Springs

By Craig: On recommendation we stayed just out of town in a caravan park adjacent to the Todd River. The number of locals walking out of the Todd River flats and into town was astounding.

I don’t think I gave Alice enough time as I was focused on getting the car serviced prior to heading up the Tanami Rd. All good as far as the car was concerned.
We took time to visit the war memorial and lookout and the rest of our time there seemed to slip by quickly while we took care of restocking supplies and having timeout.
I’m not sure about the town of Alice Springs I didn’t get a good feeling about it and I know Louise was disappointed in not seeing all it had to offer but it was, or appeared to be, yet another town marred by a lost population of people. A people whom appear caught between old culture and new (White man) ways of living & alcohol.
At this point I was tiring of the ‘You must respect our ways’ rhetoric whilst the ‘we literally litter your streets’ visual display was a daily occurrence.
I couldn’t wait to get out of there and back on the road, Tanami corrugations and all.

By Lou: I had been quite looking forward to visiting Alice Springs, even after the initial disappointment that it didn’t provide a vista to Uluru. I would love to tell you about the aboriginal art galleries, tour of the Royal Flying Doctor Service, School of the Air, and the Desert Park… but in our 5 days there we didn’t get to see any of that. Instead we just seemed to get involved in school catch up, car wash/service, laundry etc etc.
Sam was happy within the confines of the caravan park as we’d lashed out on the Big 4 which had a jumping pillow, Leap of Faith and cool playground. It was kid city but amongst all the hubbub Sam spent most of his time with Nathan and Charlotte whom we had met at King’s Canyon.
























We also spent an evening with their parents Carolyn and James in the heated comfort of their Jayco campervan. Did I mention that it has been cold for 100 years? At least the days are warm.

The sale of alcohol in town is very restricted as part of a strategy to reduce the incidence of alcohol-related harm. You can only buy takeaway grog after 3pm, unless you are after cask wine and then you have to wait till 6pm and can only buy 1 cask per person. You even have to present ID every time you purchase alcohol. It's a very effective strategy because it takes away the convenience of picking up supplies when you're down the street on other errands, and you have to make a concerted effort to head back to buy. Anyone concerned about my liver should be pleased to know the strategy worked for me as a deterrent.

After a day of running around shopping for exciting things like groceries, shoes and camp lights I desperately needed to do something touristy so we drove to Anzac Hill, providing a great vantage point over the town. I could quite happily have spent a few more days here but Craig didn’t share my sentiments and was keen to get headed on the Tanami Track up north to the warm weather (hear hear).

25 Jul 10 – West MacDonnell Ranges

By Craig: The Mereenie Loop, as it’s referred to, is a road that circles past a number of gorges in the West MacDonnell Range area. The area in general had experienced some rain in recent times and floodways still required caution on approach.








Our first stop was at Gosse Bluff (Tnorala), the site of two happenings that left an imprint both geographically and culturally. The first was a significant meteor strike only several or so million years ago leaving a fairly large crater.


The second occurrence was the massacre of the aboriginal people who inhabited the meteor site. It appears, as history tells it, that two passing Aborigine tribesmen from out of town decided they didn’t like the inhabitants of the crater area so they massacred them. The two were hunted down by the extended family members and killed in revenge. Sounds like something the Vikings would have done. Ah! Human beings we are all the same!

We visited Redbank Gorge. Two camps were available, Woodlands & the Ridge which was further into the gorge area. What’s another kilometre or so?


Well in comparison the ridge camp ground won hands down for view and I was thankful we decided to do the extra section of road and check it out. A top little spot, looking down into Redbank Gorge and across to Mt Sonder.

With a camp fire and an extremely peaceful surrounding it was a good choice, even if only for one night. The next day we walked into the gorge, the walk included a stroll along a flat creek bed and a little rock hopping from time to time.

From time to time during our walk we encountered caves and although very little was written about them Sam and I upon inspection found old fire pits.

















Other gorges visited whilst travelling the loop were

Ormiston Gorge
























Ellery Creek

















On our first evening the cloud formation appeared to divide the evening sky, quite a spectacular view.














After a while you tend to get the glossed over gorged out feeling however Finke Gorge came with several crossings of the Finke River and a valley of palms to walk around.




Slightly different to deep ravines and sheer cliffs and provided a pleasant walk and a camp ground with solar hot water showers, a bonus for the smelly traveller.























By Lou: I’m glad we chose the ‘long way round’ to get to Alice Springs, as the West MacDonell Rangers were beautiful. Many of the paintings by Albert Namatjira feature this region. When we arrived at his monument we initially thought it was an old cottage chimney. It seems an odd tribute to a creative watercolour artist.












The first photo opportunity after leaving King's Canyon arrived pretty quickly.















The township of Herrmansberg was promoted as part of the tourist trail but apart from the roadhouse and a museum there wasn't much else to it. However, all the gorges along the way were pretty speccy.





Redbank Gorge was magnificent and despite being cold, as the only campers we lit a campfire, set up the PC and watched “Treasure Planet” in our own personal amphitheatre.

Finke Gorge National Park was also a highlight, crossing multiple pebbly river beds to get to the campground which had a few other campers but more importantly a solar hot water shower.









We shared a campfire with 3 lots of other campers: 1 had been preparing their Osso Bucco over a slow fire for hours and the smells were driving us insane, and the other 2 couples were farmers from near Bendigo Victoria and they also provided great company around the fire. As usual, Samuel had introduced himself to them long before we did and was delighted when the socialising reached its peak.

22 Jul 10 – King’s Caynon

By Craig: One of the best all round walks I’ve completed to date, not too challenging on the legs and very soothing to the eyes. Just magnificent views of deep gorges and rocky outcrops with sheer drops, beautiful!


























At one point high up on top of the Cannon we came across evidence of a sea bed with ripples seemingly caught in time.










Our camp at Kings Canyon Resort Caravan Park had a magnificent backdrop and our stay there included the rim walk around the top of Kings Canyon and a night out at the local pub to see a show ‘The Roadies’.
A great night as we were able to catch up with two other couples we had been chatting with during our stay. Sam was happy as both families had children.
The show included a starring act by Sam playing or at least role playing a solo piece on the didgeridoo which sounded more like the baked bean scene out of Blazing Saddles (showing my age now) and I got a musical role singing “A Frog went walking Ah Hum”

Louise was also called to the stage with some other mums for a chorus of “Do A Diddy Diddy Dum Diddy Dum”.

By Louise: The 3 hour walk around the rim of King’s Canyon was spectacular. Sam did really well despite his only walking shoes being threadbare but was most happy when we caught up with Caroline, Steve, Liam and Tara who we had initially and briefly met in Yulara.


We tagged along together for the rest of the walk which was lovely. The Northern Territory seem to be pretty liberal with allowing access to cliff faces, and a couple of times when I looked back to where we had been standing at a cliff edge I was horrified to see what a massive overhang lay beneath.






We managed to get a few hours school done in the afternoon of the walk which was a herculean effort for Sam with all his friends running around playing.

One evening we wandered over to the pub for some “music and comedy for the whole family” and had a bit of a laugh.

We all managed to get dragged into some part of the act and received chocolates, pens and even a beer for our effort. And if you’d told me hours earlier that I’d finish the evening on the dance floor waltzing with my husband I would have called you daft but lo and behold that’s what happened. During the night we got chatting to the parents (Carolyn and James) of Sam’s new playmates (Nathan and Charlotte) from Victoria and enjoyed a few camping horror stories (of the suburban myth type).


Other points of interest were the flowering native plants


Beautiful landscapes


and some of the local characters