Coober Pedy

As we were visiting Coober Pedy we decided that it would be part of the experience to stay in an underground motel instead of camping. We ended up at The Lookout Cave which was a friendly and comfortable hotel, although a little warm after sleeping outdoors for the last few months! It looks pretty ordinary from the front when you actually find it, but it was nice inside. You can climb up some stairs to the top of the hill the hotel is dug into and see 360 degree views of Coober Pedy.

Coober Pedy is not beautiful, or well looked after, but it is certainly interesting and unusual! The businesses in town seem to look after each other, often referring you to one of the others with a reward/discount as a thank you for visiting. And, of course, there are the opals!



A view of town from the top of our hotel

different angle from the top of the motel

a drill

This blower is a big vacuum that helps to remove excess dirt/rocks from the mine. Neil and Liam are having a turn putting rocks in the vacuum. It is very powerful and sucks your hand in with the big rocks. You can see these everywhere around Coober Pedy

Inside the 'Old Timer's Mine'

Inside 'Tom's Working Mine' - a modern mine

The texture of the drilled out walls inside the hotel room

Liam pretending to sleep in his cave bedroom!

Baby Prue at Josephines. They have art, opals and kangaroos. Seems like a strange combination but the kangaroos certainly draw a crowd into their shop at the 12pm and 5.30pm feeding times. The kangaroos are all rescued kangaroos after mothers are killed by hunting, road accidents or misadventure (eg, barbed wire fences). The girl holding the kangaroo is a French tourist who is working with them as part of her Australian holiday.

The moon setting early in the morning over Coober Pedy

Uluru - Kata Tjuta National Park

I have wanted to visit Uluru for so long that I nearly started crying when we finally saw it in the landscape. It is a beautiful and amazing place.

Things you need to know if you are planning to visit:

It is worth making a phone call to book a few days in advance if you want power: There is only one place you can stay - Ayres Rock Resort, Yulara. Within the resort there are several hotels, units and of course the caravan park where we stayed. We had not booked, as we hadn't needed to for most places, so we spent the next three nights in the "overflow area" with a few hundred other people. There were no powered sites left for caravans, camper trailers and other accomodation that uses vehicles. There were heaps of powered tent sites available. The site was actually fine for us as we were set up to be self sufficient without power, and it only cost us $15 a night! The only problem was it was a bit of a hike from the toilet, which is fine, until you need to pee at 4.30 in the morning! We also found that the solar powered showers in the park were only warm enough to shower under if you showered during sunlight hours - which kind of sucked on the first night when I found this out the hard way. It probably didn't help that we arrived on the Friday night, when the school holidays started. It was also a long weeeknd for Territory Day!

Beer - the cheapest option, a six pack of Melbourne Bitter, cost $39.90 in the resort. Best to BYO!

Fuel - Diesel was $2.05 per litre at Yulara, which was cheaper than Curtin Springs down the road @ $2.34/l. Take extra fuel like we did and you might be able to get to Erldunda and fill up for $1.93/l.

There are so many people there it is hard to find a quiet spot to enjoy the spirituality of the place.

Uluru

The land around Uluru is so flat that its immense presence in the landscape holds a power over you as you approach it. You can understand why it is such an important spiritual place to the Anangu people.

Entry to the park is $25 per person over 15 (children and NT residents free) for three days. You can only pay at the entry gate. The park opens very early but does change depending upon the time of year, taking into consideration sunrise, sunset and daytime temperatures. Sunrise was at 7.30ish so we had to leave the caravan park around 6.30. It was very cold (I was going to say "freezing" but then I remembered what all my friends and family in Canberra have been experiencing in the mornings and decided to pull back a bit!) This first photograph is as we are driving around to the sunrise viewing area. You actually have to drive what feels like almost the whole way around the rock before you can find the viewing area.

These next few photos are from the Mala walk. We took the free ranger guided walk with about 40 or more other people, hearing the traditional story that applies in this area and learning how some of the areas were and are used by Anangu people. It was fascinating. Of course, we only heard the "kids" version of the story as you are not able to hear more layers of the story until you have spent considerable time living and learning in the area. We didn't bother taking any photos until we were on our way back. We waited until most of the others moved on.

You can see the black mark where, after rain, water flows down to fill the waterhole in the area behind me.
The water in this waterhole used to be drinkable but over time as more people have visited/climbed on Uluru the water has become toxic to humans and other animals. 

 Around the base of Uluru, erosion has created these amazing rock waves which provide shelters and each shelter serves a different purpose. Some are cooking areas, classrooms and others ceremonial areas.

Don't climb Uluru!

The Uluru climb is still open, despite Anangu requests that people don't climb it. This is as a result of the agreement that had to be signed when the land was handed back to the Anangu people. This meant leasing the land back to the government (99 year lease) and keeping the climb open. Being such an icon I guess it draws tourism from all over Australia and around the world. It is very political. It is hoped that the government will agree to close the climb within a few years. I was disappointed with the number of people who did the climb and the poor attitude some people have to respecting other people's cultures. However, I suspect there were many more who did not climb for each person that did. 

Three reasons not to climb:

• respect for culture/religion
• environmental considerations (erosion, pollution - rubbish and toileting)
• personal safety

Kata Tjuta

You can see Kata Tjuta from Uluru although it is a 50km drive to get there. Liam's favourite thing about it was a big rock that well...looked kind of like a bum...so we named it bum rock! Then when we got there we realised there were two walks you could do, Walpa Gorge and Valley of the Winds. You can imagine the laughs we had. Liam suggested that Andy Griffith's, author of The Day My Bum Went Psycho etc, would love it! We had to settle down though and be quiet and respectful.

Walpa Gorge

Valley of the Winds

Valley of the Winds

Alice Springs

Sunset Camel Ride @ the McDonnell Ranges

Alice Springs Desert Park

A great place to learn about flora and fauna of central Australia, and how Aboriginal people survive in harsh desert environments through their law, technology and knowledge of plants and animals.

Mataranka

Mataranka Hot Springs

Mataranka Hot Springs

bossy Mr Peacock

Hard to photograph in the dusk: thousands of flying foxes arriving at their feeding grounds in the palm forest near the hot springs. They flew off in the other direction early the next morning sounding like thousands of birds.

Kakadu

We only had one full day in Kakadu so we had to decide on one place we would go and see. When in Katherine we had heard that Yellow Water was a great place to see animals; birds in particular, so we decided to focus on that.

Yellow Water Sunrise Cruise
At the tourist information centre in Darwin we booked into the Yellow Water sunrise cruise; departing at 6.45. This meant we had to be at reception for the bus (we stayed at the caravan park - Gagaju @ Cooinda - which ran the tours) at 6.25am. We knew it would be cold so we dug our warm clothes out of the bottom of our bags.

The view from the boat when we got on board. If you look carefully you can see the reflection of the stars in the water.

A jacana walking on water

Never smile at a crocodile, especially a big salty like this!

...or this

I never knew Azure Kingfishers were so tiny!

White bellied sea eagle

Rufous Night Heron - a very shy, and statuesque bird.

The birds don't bat an eyelid

whistling ducks...they really do whistle and quite a lot

ibis and egret

Jabiru, with Magpie geese (breeding trio) and egrets

The vastness of the landscape. Three months earlier these grasses were completely covered in water.

Burrungui and Anbangbang - Nourlangie

The place commonly known as Nourlangie was named incorrectly by white settlers when it was mistaken for a nearby area. Burrungui and Anbangbang are the correct names for the land in this area. On maps of Kakadu you will see the name Nourlangie but when you arrive there there is a sign which asks that the proper names be used. The main reason to visit this area is to see an aboriginal rock shelters (traditionally used in the wet season) and rock art. It was also conveniently close to Yellow Water!

A small section of the area that was used for shelter

somewhere to grind seeds into flour 

like to dance?

Fishing Yellow Water

We were considering going on the sunset cruise to see the billabong at a different time (would have been cheaper) but in the end we decided to go fishing instead. It was the best decision. On the boat was the three of us (Maddi left us in Darwin) and our guide/boat driver. This meant that for three hours we were able to enjoy Yellow Water Billabong and river without all of those pesky tourists getting in our way, and standing in front of our photos.

our private vessel

Liam got to drive

Neil caught a barramundi (which was too small so we had to throw it back).

Libby and Liam caught some weeds

We saw more birds...

...and crocodiles (this one was massive)

and we watched the sun set!

This video was taken just after the sun disappeared over the horizon so the quality is worse than usual, however, it gives you a sense of the activity, and peacefulness, of the place. Enjoy.