Outback Safari

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   The one place that I had wanted to go to while being in Australia was Alice Springs.  This is a smaller town located right in the center of Australia.  I felt like a trip to Australia would not be complete without venturing into the outback.  This turned out to be the best trip I have taken and I will never forget the sights of Alice Springs and the surrounding area.    Getting to Alice Springs was quite the headache. I went with another American student, Sonya.  We had to fly there but there is no direct flights to Alice so instead we had to fly to Brisbane, Sydney and then Alice Springs.  Well our flight got into Brisbane early in the morning on Monday and didn't leave until 5am on Tuesday so we had a whole day to explore Brisbane.     We stashed our bags in the airport and headed around the city.  We decided that a tour of the XXXX (four ex) brewery would be a good way to start our day.  XXXX is the most popular Australian beer.  We had lunch in the brewery restaurant and then went on the tour.  We learned all about the history of the company and how their fabulous beer is made.  After our tour we headed into the downtown area where we got dinner and caught a late movie.  Then we headed back to the airport to sleep on some benches until our flight in the morning.

   Flying to Alice Springs was a long flight but I was entertained the whole time by watching the landscape slowly change from the lush coastal regions to the dry dessert.  The dessert (well actually it isn't technically a dessert, it's a semi-arid region, which means that it is a dessert but they still get rain occasionally) is red.  Bright red.  I was so amazed at the color of the dirt and sand.  Every once in awhile I would see a house with a big tin roof in the distance but there was nothing else surrounding it.  I don't know how people would be able to live in the middle of no where.  Alice Springs itself was a bigger town than I had expected.  There was a little shopping mall in the center of town.  This is where we had dinner the first night.    We decided that we should eat some Aussie food.  So we had a crocodile salad for a started and then we had kangaroo steak, emu, camel, and barramundi.   The Emu was my favorite!  The next morning we were up early to head into the outback.

  We went on a 3 days safari to Uluru, Kata Tjuta, and Kings Canyon.  The first day we drove in a big 4 wheel drive truck to Yulara.  Yulara is the town that is located near Ayers Rock.  It was about a 4 hour drive.  We stopped at the tiny random gas stations along the way.  At one station you could ride camels.  So I experienced my first camel ride.  I didn't know this until my ride, but Australia has a population of about 1 million wild camels!  We also stopped on the side of the road to gather some fire wood.  While we were doing that we saw a few red kangaroos.  These kangaroos can grow up to 8 feet tall! The ones we saw were probably about 6 feet.  They were huge!!!  Right after we saw them we also saw a heard of brumbies.  Brumbies are wild horses the roam the outback.  Our guide told us that it is pretty rare to see them too so we got lucky.

   That night after making it to Yulara we had a nice lunch and then headed to Kata Tjuta (aka the olgas).  This is another rock formations just like ayer's rock. I have never taken so many pictures of rocks, but these were amazing.  There is nothing around and then all of the sudden these huge red rocks and just sticking up above the ground.  The contrast between the blue sky and the red rock was really cool.  We did a quick hike between a few of the domes of Kata Tjuta.  After that we headed to a sunset viewing area and watched the sunset behind Ayers Rock.    We had a glass of champagne while we watched the sunset.  This was amazing too because the rock started to glow a bright orange color while the sun went down.  It looked like it came alive.  After the sunset the night sky was unbelievable.    There were no city lights anywhere so the sky was pitch black and I have never seen so many stars!    The next morning we were up at 5:30 in order to watch the sunrise at Ayers Rock.  We decided to do the base walk around the rock.  This was a 3 hour rock around the perimeter of the rock.  It was so cold!  At night the temperature got down to about 30 degrees and during the say it would get to about 60.  I guess the winters in the desert get really cold.  While we were walking around Uluru we got to see it glow again as the sun rose.  We were also able to see all the erosion and detail of the rock.    After the sunrise walk we started to drive to King's Canyon.  We were up early the next morning in order to fit in the 3.5 hour hike around the canyon before heading back to Alice Springs.  The canyon was really pretty.  We saw fossils in the rock from the time of the dinosaurs.   Our guide also pointed out some plants that have been around since the time of the dinosaurs and they only exist in that part of Australia.  It was amazing to learn about how old Australia really is.  We hiked around the top of the canyon and then went down into the canyon to a place called the garden of eden.  In the middle of the canyon was a little river and tons of beautiful palm trees and plants.  After we finished our walk we headed back for a quick lunch before heading back to Alice Springs.

   While we were driving back we stopped to look at Lake Armadeas.  This was a dried up salt water lake that used to be part of the ocean that covered Australia hundreds of millions of years ago.  We also drove over the Phinke River.  This is the oldest river in the world.  It obviously was also dried up but it was crazy to think about this desert having water and rivers flowing all over it.    I really enjoyed our trip and I wish I could have spent more time exploring the area.  I feel as though my trip to Australia is complete after visiting the outback!