After a quiet day on New Year's Day, we said goodbye to Norbert and Ruth the following morning.  It had been great to spend some time together and hopefully our paths will cross again before we leave Australia.  We drove north up the coast to Port Stephens, an area that Norbert and Ruth had recommended to us as there are beautiful beaches and dune areas that can be explored D.  Roel had discovered on the internet that it was possible to camp for free on one of the beaches, Samurai beach, and from the information leaflet we got from Norbert and Ruth we found that we could also drive the Landy on this beach for free - perfect!  We spent almost a week camping there and met some lovely friendly people who spend their Christmas and New Year holidays there every year.  Despite the fact that they all knew each other well, they made us feel very welcome and we had a fantastic time.  One of the couples there also had a roof-tent and this was how we found out that a 4WD / roof-tent combo is generally referred to as a 'snail' in Australia.  When another Landy with a roof-tent turned up (with its owners, a lovely Aussie/British couple, Andy and Vanessa) there was much hilarity among the other campers about this being the offspring of the first two 'snails'...

On a tip from one of the people we'd met at Samurai, we headed further up the coast to Crowdy Bay National Park, where we spent a lovely couple of days camping just 5 minutes' walk from another gorgeous (and practically deserted) beach.  Heading inland from there, we spent three nights at a small private campsite near Ellenborough, which is known for its beautiful waterfalls.  We then made a brief return to civilisation, spending a night in the coastal city of Coffs Harbour, as Lizzy had a translation to do.  All that bustle was just too much and we took another three day break at a small private campsite just inland from Coffs before heading to the city of Tamworth to experience the annual Australian Country Music Festival.

Tamworth is the home of country music in Australia and in the last week of January each year the country vibe steps up a notch further as it is invaded by hordes of country music fans.  It also happens to be the nearest city to the farm and jackaroo school ('jackaroo' is Australian for cowboy, in case you were wondering - the female equivalent is a jillaroo!) where Lizzy spent a combined 3 months working the last time she was in Australia (in 2000).  So all in all a bit of a must-see on our itinerary.  Luckily for us, Frank, one of the lovely people we had met on Samurai beach, happens to live right in the centre of Tamworth and we were able to park the Landy in his garden and camp there.

We arrived on the first day of the festival and that evening, eager to sample its delights, we went to the opening concert with Frank and his girlfriend Hanna.  Wending our way there through Tamworth's main streets, the festival atmosphere was already much in evidence.  The main street was closed to traffic and filled with festival-goers and stalls.  The opening concert itself was a pretty informal affair, held in a park and open to everyone for free.  The format involved a wide variety of artists (and country music is definitely varied) each performing a couple of numbers, an ideal taster of the festival to come.  After the show, we wandered round those bars that would let us in - foolishly, Roel had worn his thongs (not to disappoint the Brits among you who were having visions of Aussie bouncers getting to do underwear inspections and considering emigrating and a career change, but perhaps we should mention that 'thongs' is Australian for 'flip-flops').  Annoyingly this seems to be the Aussie equivalent of a posh dress code in many bars: 'Filthy work boots and torn clothing welcome, but NO THONGS'.  Still, the bars we could get into had a wide variety of music and clientele and together they kept us thoroughly entertained until it was time to go home.

Next morning we had an early start for the 'Bush Poets' Breakfast' at the Longyard Hotel.  Essentially this involves eating breakfast while listening to poetry.  Except that this isn't the kind of poetry you'll hear in Europe.  Aussie bush poets are, or affect to be, down-to-earth country blokes (OK, we did see one 'sheila' but her material seemed to belong to a slightly different genre) and their subject matter and sense of humour have a similarly 'down-to-earth' tendency...  One or two jokes missed the mark (or perhaps we just didn't get the 'cultural' references), but for the most part it was side-splittingly funny.

That evening Frank and Hanna decided to have a quiet night in so we went out to explore alone.  The atmosphere on the streets was even livelier than the night before (well, it was Saturday night), with crowds of people wandering up and down among the buskers, street performers and stalls.  There was a guy doing a brilliant show with live poisonous snakes, giving lots of useful info about what to do if you see a snake or are bitten by one (not that remote a possibility in Australia, unfortunately).  We were really impressed by one of the buskers who was managing to play about 7 different instruments at the same time, though we lost interest and drifted away when his mate claiming to be the 'world's best air guitarist' joined him (after all, we all know that the world's best air guitarist is Roel, don't we?).  After this, our attention was caught by a band just starting a gig in front of one of the bars on the main street, catchily named 'Jeremy Edwards and the Dust Radio Band'.  Despite the name, we really liked their music and stopped to enjoy it (and have a beer) for the next couple of hours.

We had a quiet last evening in Tamworth.  Frank and Hanna had tickets for the final of 'Starmaker', Tamworth's most prestigious talent contest.  Being an extremely popular concert this had sold out well before the start of the festival, but we were happy to have a quiet evening in for a change.

Next day, we had planned to go on a camping trip for a few days with Frank and Hanna, to a farm near Glen Innes.  We arranged to meet them there and on the way we visited the farm and jackaroo school where Lizzy had worked in 2000.  There was nobody around at the farm, so after a quick look round we headed up to the jackaroo school, high in the hills above Tamworth.  Here we got a warm welcome from Tim, the owner, who remembered Lizzy from 7 years ago, and from the current staff and students.  It was fantastic for Lizzy to be back and to be able to show Roel the place where she'd had so much fun just a month or two before they met each other.  After a good look round and chat, we reluctantly headed north to Glen Innes.

The farm turned out to be a fantastic place.  We camped just beside a creek, which was perfect for swimming.  The owner, Steve, had several horses and he showed us both all around the 500 hectare property on horseback.  We spent each day pottering around the farm and doing our own thing and in the evenings we met up with Frank and Hanna and Steve for drinks while we watched the sun set.  We said a fond farewell to Frank and Hanna on Friday, as they had tickets for another concert in Tamworth on the Saturday, but we had decided to stay on for a couple of days as we were heading in the opposite direction anyway.

After a couple more blissful days, we were back on the road, heading north towards Brisbane.  We stopped for a couple of nights at a nice small campsite just west of Casino, a last bit of peace and quiet before we hit the crowds on the coast.  Byron Bay was everything we'd expected it to be - pleasant, with a slightly 'alternative' feel, but just too touristy for us.  We spent the afternoon there but kept on driving north towards Brisbane before settling on a small campsite on the beach at Kingscliff for our overnight stop.

Next morning, we'd planned to spend a few hours exploring Surfer's Paradise and Southport (no, not the one in northwest England, thank goodness) before arriving with our friends John and Mandy (whom we met in Istanbul - see the 'Turkey' page for that story) in the middle of the afternoon.  But we had not counted on two important factors: the time difference and the sheer ugliness of the high rise buildings in Surfers and Southport.  We woke up around 7.30am (New South Wales time), which is fairly early by our standards, but even earlier by Queensland standards as Queenslanders vigorously oppose the introduction of summer time (or 'daylight saving' as it's known in Australia - i.e. putting the clocks forward an hour in summer to take account of the longer days).  This is a huge issue in Australia, a fact which just bemuses us.  Western Australia has just (reluctantly) introduced daylight saving for a trial period of three years, Queensland staunchly refuses to do so and, if some of our informants are to believed, New South Welshmen (as they call themselves), who do have daylight saving, have been trying to get a referendum to get rid of it for years!  We've been party to several heated debates on the subject and we have to say that, to us, the arguments against seem totally ridiculous, ranging as they do from 'the curtains will fade more' (why???) to 'the cows will get confused' (how the hell do the cows know what time it is anyway?), via just about any ludicrous argument you can think of in between.

 Anyway, let's just say that we crossed the 'border' into Queensland around 7.30am (Queensland time).  This gave us about 6 hours to enjoy the delights of Queensland's famous Gold Coast and get to Brisbane mid-afternoon as planned.  This turned out to be about six times as much as we really needed.  Everything about Surfers and Southport reminded us of anonymous Spanish holiday resorts we have known and hated.  We just couldn't bring ourselves to do more than stop for a few photos, so we drew up at John and Mandy's door around 11am, a good three hours earlier than planned...  Despite this, we got a warm welcome from John and Mandy and their two lovely kids, Jaimie and Callum.  It was great to see them all again and catch up on what they had been up to since they got back from their trip round Europe.  They were just in the thick of selling their gorgeous house in a posh Brisbane suburb as they have bought a plot of land at a new eco-development down the coast, so we pitched in and lent a hand with the cleaning up to say thanks for having us.  We had some great evenings sitting out on their balcony chatting and eating delicious food.  On the Saturday evening, we took the CityCat catamaran service along the river through the centre of Brisbane and had a picnic in a park on the South Bank.  Sunday was a quiet day and then on Monday we headed off to spend a few days (before returning to Brisbane for a dentist's appointment for Lizzy on Friday) on beautiful peaceful Moreton Island (just off the coast opposite Brisbane but you'd never guess).  This is the third largest sand island in the world and perfect territory for our Landy.  We are writing this from our lovely secluded camping spot just off an amazing beach with clear turquoise water - bliss!

20^th March 2007 update - Heat, dust and insects: finally, the real Australia!

Our last update was written from our beachside camping spot on Moreton Island, one of the most beautiful places we've been in Australia.  It was amazing, but in our eagerness to emphasize just how idyllic it was (no point doing a world trip if you can't make people at home jealous, is there?) we may have slightly neglected to mention the large numbers of March flies with whom we had to share this paradise.  March flies are outsize flies which, despite their size, have a cunning ability to land very softly on any exposed patch of flesh without attracting its owner's attention.  They then proceed to make their presence felt by delivering a nasty bite, which stays painful long after they've been chased away by the enraged victim (and friend(s) - it's at least a two-man job to get one of these monsters to leave you alone).  Not very pleasant.  And this is the thing we've been learning about Australia since we wrote the last update - wherever there is natural beauty, there will be insects.  Lots of them.

Our next couple of weeks were fairly insect-free, though.  From Moreton Island we returned to Brisbane for Lizzy to have the dentist's visit mentioned in the last update.  This was for repairs to a broken tooth (not painful, I didn't even feel it happening) and resulted in a crown (no pain there either - except in the financial sense - as the tooth had already been root-filled in London).  It was great to see John and Mandy again and we had a fun Friday night out with them in 'the Valley', Brisbane's Chinatown, which is also one of its liveliest areas for nightlife.  Due to the huge numbers of Asian immigrants in Australia, you can get a great variety of amazing Asian food in Australian cities and we had a delicious Vietnamese meal.  As is often the case in Australia, the restaurant allowed customers to bring their own alcohol - it's a shame this system isn't more common in Europe as even with the small corkage charge eating out is so much more affordable.  And you get to drink what you really want rather than whatever the restaurant decides to offer!

On Saturday, we got the chance to meet some of Mandy's family as her parents and her sister's family came round for dinner.  It was great to chat to them, especially Mandy's mum and dad who have also travelled a good deal in Europe and Australia.  We said another temporary farewell (another dentist's appointment to have the crown fitted in 2 weeks' time) on Sunday and set off to explore a bit further up the Queensland coast.  We spent a pleasant afternoon on the beach in the National Park near Noosa, then headed towards Cooloola beach in the Great Sandy National Park.  We stopped for the night at a campsite on the way and spent the evening chatting to some travellers from the UK, one of whom turned out to have been at university in Aberdeen with Lizzy's cousin, Charlie!  Just another one of life's weird coincidences!

Cooloola beach is a long, exposed sandy beach, which is open to 4WDs and popular for camping and fishing.  The surf was pretty rough and there was quite a lot of traffic on the beach, so all in all it didn't feel that conducive for swimming or wandering along the beach.  We found a sheltered camping spot and spent a night there, but we were happy to pack up in the morning and move on.  As we headed inland along a dirt track, heavy rain set in and soon we were splashing through deep puddles, covering the Landy in muddy water.  The rain cleared as we approached the pleasant little town of Rainbow Beach and we took the opportunity to give the Landy a good wash to get rid of the sand and mud.

With the Landy sparkling again, we set off towards Hervey Bay, stopping for lunch in a restaurant overlooking the river in the 'heritage' area of Maryborough, which is basically a street of charming historic buildings painted in traditional yellows and browns.  This is quite a contrast to the rest of town, which has the usual range of modern practical low-rise buildings in dull grey or white that you find in every small Australian town.  Hervey Bay is not the most charming town either - an amalgamation of two or three different centres, it has some pleasant beachfront and a strip of shops and cafes to go with it, but the rest of town sprawls across a large area and doesn't really have a centre, with most activity seeming to focus around the car dealerships and outlet-style shops on the main highway.  Despite this we ended up spending almost a week in Hervey Bay - we met some nice people on the campsite and Lizzy spent several days doing translations.  The weather was pretty variable, but there was a nice recreation room on the campsite, so Roel got to catch up on some internet (free) and we both had a chance to hone our technique playing pool in the evenings!

From Hervey Bay, we went on up the coast to Bundaberg and spent a few days staying on a farm just north of there, whose owners, Rick and Aileen, are a retired couple who take campers because they just like to have people around.  They used to grow oranges and mangoes on the property and there were still lots of orange and mango trees close to where we were camping.  Sadly we were too late for the mangoes, but there were still some oranges on the trees and Rick invited us to help ourselves.  Some of them were clearly past their best, but we managed to find a few nice-looking ones.  Lizzy settled down to enjoy one, but after she had eaten the first couple of pieces (which tasted delicious) she noticed a maggot crawling out of the rest of the orange!  On closer inspection there were tens of tiny maggots in all the remaining pieces - yuck!   Rick investigated the other two oranges and showed where fruitflies had pierced the skin to lay their eggs.  Hastily, Lizzy threw these and the remainder of the orange she'd peeled away, trying not to think about how many maggots she'd already eaten without knowing...  Another strike for the Australian insects!

Bundaberg itself seemed a bit like Hervey Bay - a maze of car dealerships and outlet-style shops - though the broad, palm tree-lined main street has more traditional buildings which give it a bit of character.  Bundaberg is not on the coast, but we drove out to the seaside resort of Bargara, a few kilometres away, which has a pleasant atmosphere and a narrow strip of beach.  We had decided not to go any further north up the Queensland coast on this trip, as it was still the wet season and we'd travelled down the coast from Cairns to Brisbane last time we visited Australia.  So we turned south again, stopping for a couple of nights near Childers, which has most recently been known nationally and internationally for the fire at the Palace backpackers' hostel in June 2000.  The former hostel building has now been converted into an art gallery, with a moving memorial to each of the 15 backpackers who died.  It was strange to see pictures of these young people, many of whom were British or Dutch, and think that this happened only a month after we left Australia the last time ourselves.  We didn't stop in Childers on our last visit, but we stayed in many hostels in Queensland and across Australia and may well have met some of those who died in the months before the fire.  Visiting the memorial brought home to us how incredibly lucky we have been so far in our lives and how little any of us knows what's going to happen in the future.  The experience left us even more determined to observe the motto on the side of our Landy: 'One life. Live it.'

We stayed at a campsite in the middle of the bush, not far from Childers.  This was a lovely peaceful spot and one of the highlights of our stay was seeing some wild possums up close one evening as they came to eat food put out for them by the campsite owner.  One of the female possums had been cared for by the owner after losing her mother when she was too young to fend for herself and then returned to the wild, so she showed no fear and even let us get close enough to stroke her and her baby, which was riding on her back.  It was great to get this close and see how beautiful possums are, particularly as possums get quite a negative press in Australia with most Australians regarding them as vermin.

Back in Brisbane, Lizzy had her crown fitted and we spent a last couple of nights enjoying Mandy and John's company and having fun with their kids, Jaimie and Callum.  After Brisbane our route lay inland, towards the red centre of Australia, and much as we'd enjoyed our 'holiday' along the coast of New South Wales and Queensland we were impatient to get on and face the challenges of rough roads and high temperatures that awaited us.  So we set off west towards Ipswich, on the edge of the Great Dividing Range.  We had meant to spend a night or so at a small campsite just south of there that we'd heard about, but Lizzy unexpectedly received several translations to do so we ended up staying longer than planned (again).  Luckily we had some very good company there so Roel didn't have a chance to get bored!

Finally, after almost a week, we set off again, crossing the Great Dividing Range at Cunningham's Gap and pressing on across the rolling plains known as the Darling Downs.  Our first stop was a tiny place called Nindigully, which we'd seen on a travel programme on the Australia Network satellite channel while staying in Chennai.  Like many outback towns, Nindigully basically consists of a pub.  This pub is famous for a number of outback events held there every year and as the location used in one of Hugh Jackman's early films - Paperback Hero, the heart-warming story of a long-distance truck driver who just happens to write romantic fiction in his spare time.  As you can imagine, this isn't one of Jackman's best-known movies, though it just happens to be well-known to us as the video was given to us some years ago (as a joke on the 'truck driver' theme) by our film-buff friends Matt & Susan!  We spent a pleasant few hours in the bar that evening, chatting to the Irish backpacker working behind the bar and later on to some of the locals and losing some money in the weekly 'Goose Club' (outback Australian for 'raffle', apparently).  It's a nice bar, though perhaps not as authentic as some we've visited since.  One definite plus is the fact that they let you camp for free!

After Nindigully, we drove via St. George and Cunnamulla to a little place called Eulo, where we again camped out the back of the pub (not free this time, sadly).  This was a more typical Australian country pub, a bit less photogenic but with lots of interesting memorabilia and friendly owners behind the bar (him) and cooking great simple food (her).  We had an early night (too many beers at Nindigully!) and headed on north-west in the morning.  This felt like the start of the outback proper - a short stretch of the road was unsealed and we hardly saw anyone until we reached the small town of Quilpie (a mere 230km 'up the road'), where we stopped for a break and a cold drink at the pub.  You'll probably have noticed by now that all our stops since Nindigully have involved pubs - there's a reason for this and it's not (well, not entirely) that we are alcoholics.  As we've headed further inland, the number of flies has increased exponentially with every stop.  Luckily they don't bother you when driving - once you've ejected the ones that flew in at the last stop, that is - but the minute you stop, there they are again.  And, unlike flies in Europe, they're not much interested in sitting on your arm or your leg or the table - oh no, all they want to do is sit on your face, preferably on your lips or eyelashes, or in your ear!  It is, quite literally, infuriating.  And the only way to escape them is to get inside a building and close the doors behind you.  Hence our obsession with pubs (well, there aren't a lot of teashops or juice bars in outback Australia, are there?).

Our next pub was in Windorah, another 250km north west.  Arriving in the late afternoon, long before the flies' bedtime (around dusk), there was only one place to go.  We spent a pleasant couple of hours chatting to a bloke who had been working on several stations (i.e. massive farms) near Windorah and his dad who was visiting from Victoria.  Another guy we were talking to started telling us that he made a living by going 'roo-shooting' all night, four nights a week.  We must have looked pretty incredulous, because he dragged us outside to see his Land Cruiser which was specially kitted out with bars and hooks for up to 64 kangaroos (an average night's haul) and then over the road to check on his walk-in chiller where about 400 roo carcases were hanging by their feet waiting to be collected by truck the next day!  He explained that although he has to have a licence to be allowed to shoot kangaroos, the meat is still only used for pet food as it hasn't been slaughtered under the conditions required for human consumption.  This would explain why you rarely see kangaroo meat for sale in supermarkets.  Most wild roos live in remote areas, where it's not practical for them to be slaughtered under such stringent conditions, so not much roo meat ever makes it to the Aussie dinner table.

From Marree, we took the Oodnadatta Track to William Creek, reputed to be Australia's smallest town.  Only 7 people live there at the moment and, as we heard from the chatty former owner of the William Creek pub, 2 of them aren't very popular with the others (for setting up a new campsite and café to rival the pub)...  Despite the smallness of its human population, we are able to report that William Creek's fly population is exceptionally high, even for this area.  After a cold drink and a chat in the pub, we made tracks for the opal-mining town of Coober Pedy.  A few kilometres south of there, we were back on the asphalt for the first time in 1200 km.  By normal standards, Coober Pedy is pretty isolated, but compared to Birdsville, Marree and William Creek it felt like a return to civilisation for us.

It was also a return of a different kind, as it is the place where we first met, in April 2000.  It was a strange feeling to be back at the little terrace outside Radeka's Downunder Backpackers, where we had seen each other for the first time seven years ago.  We had a beer from the hostel bar in memory of old times - with special dispensation from the hostel owner as officially they can only serve residents - and indulged in a little reminiscing.  From Coober Pedy to Darwin, our trip will continue to follow the route that we took together in 2000, so no doubt there'll be a few more places along the way that bring back memories.

We spent a few days in Coober Pedy, wandering round this strange, dusty little town and soaking up the atmosphere.  Its winding, hilly streets are lined with mines and underground homes, many of which are now tourist attractions, not to mention the dozens of opal shops on the main street.  Despite the rarity of a big find, people from all over the world are still lured here by the promise of getting rich quick and the town is full of different nationalities, united by the crazy gleam in their eye that denotes an optimism beyond all reason.  Even when they do make a reasonable find, we heard from a former manager of the town's fanciest hotel, the Desert Cave, that they simply bring the money straight down there and have it changed into dollar coins to try their luck all over again on the 'pokies' (the fruit machines that are a feature of almost every Australian pub)!

On our way north from Coober Pedy we made a detour to visit the Painted Desert, which many Australians we'd met had raved about.  It is a striking collection of hills, which look as though they've been painted in stripes by the red and yellow layers in the rock, but it's inhabited by huge numbers of flies, all of whom turned out to greet our arrival.  Luckily, we'd finally succumbed and purchased the ultimate tourist accessories - fly-nets to cover our heads - in Coober Pedy, but it still wasn't much fun.  Ultimately, as we spent a couple of hot, sticky hours cleaning the inside of the Landy at our campsite in Marla that afternoon (the fine 'bulldust' in the outback gets absolutely everywhere), we weren't convinced it was worth the 200km round trip on dirt roads...

From Marla, our next stop was Alice Springs, right in the centre of Australia.  Most tourists turn off the Stuart Highway north of Marla to head west to Uluru (Ayers Rock), but as our friend Michiel was coming out in less than a week to join us for a few weeks our plan was to meet him in Alice Springs first and then visit Uluru together.  We installed ourselves on the lovely green MacDonnell Ranges campsite in Alice Springs (where, amazingly, there are hardly any flies) and settled down for a few days' relaxation, interspersed by the odd translation, a service for the Landy and writing this update.  We did venture out for an overnight trip to the East MacDonnell Range, which has some beautiful gorges (Trephina Gorge was stunning), but Ross River Resort, where we spent the night, seemed to be suffering from a plague of tiny biting ants (as well as the usual flies and mosquitoes of course), so we were only too pleased to return to Alice Springs and the fly-free haven of the campsite!

12^th April 2007 update - a very sociable few weeks!

Our friend Michiel arrived on Tuesday 20^th March to join us for three weeks.  It was great to see him again and we spent the next few days on the campsite in Alice Springs just hanging out and catching up on what he'd been up to in the last year.  We'd also been joined by fellow overlanders Norbert and Ruth (whom we've now met up with in the Netherlands, Istanbul, Cappadocia, Islamabad, the Blue Mountains, Sydney and now Alice Springs!), so we suddenly had loads of great company on the campsite!

After a couple of fun days relaxing, we packed up and headed towards Uluru (formerly known as Ayers Rock).  En route, we stopped at the National Road Transport Hall of Fame, which has a collection of well-preserved vintage trucks and cars and lots of information about the challenges of road transport across Australia.  Needless to say, Roel found it totally riveting, but even if you weren't that into trucks it was still pretty interesting.  We arrived at Uluru an hour or so before sunset and went straight to the sunset viewing point, which gives a really good view of 'the rock'.  We all found it a really impressive sight, even though Roel and Lizzy had been there before in 2000.  Unfortunately it was quite overcast, which didn't bode well for the sunset.  Luckily for us, just an hour before sunset there was a break in the clouds and the sun's rays suddenly lit the rock with a beautiful orange colour.  This lasted a few minutes and then it clouded over again - no chance of a beautiful sunset that night.  We headed for the campground and spent a pleasant evening there chatting to a Danish couple.

About 5.30 the next morning, we awoke to the sound of other campers packing up to go and watch the sunrise.  We had already been warned that there's no point not getting up for sunrise at this campsite because you'll be awake anyway whether you like it or not.  We still managed to be the last people to get up and as we sped along the 20km or so to the sunrise viewing point it was already getting light.  The scene when we got there was unbelievable - hundreds of people, all armed with cameras, standing in the road waiting for the sun to come over the horizon and light up the rock.  The sunrise itself was a pretty impressive sight too - it was quite cloudy but this just meant that we got to take photographs of the beautiful pink sky to the east as well as the enormous red rock to the west!

As we were up already, we thought we might as well go for a walk before it got hot.  We had decided not to climb the rock - we never really understand the obsession people have with conquering mountains anyway and the local Aboriginal people specifically ask that you don't climb the rock as it's sacred to them and under their laws only specific members of their community are allowed to climb it for ceremonial purposes.  The walk we had decided to go on left from the same car park as the climb and we were amazed to see how busy it was on the climb route up the side of the rock.  There are lots of signs asking you not to climb but it's left up to the individual to decide whether to climb, as under Aboriginal law it's very important that each individual makes their own choice to follow the law.  Even so, we were really surprised that so many people decided to ignore the wishes of the Aboriginal people.

The walk we went on followed the base of the rock round for a short distance and gave a good opportunity to see the varied colours of the rock up close.  There were also some interesting stories along the way about what the local Aboriginal people believe about the creation of the various features of the rock by ancestral hare-wallaby beings.  To Europeans, these tend to seem pretty unbelievable, involving hollows being made by the passage of ancient ancestral creation animal beings, but it's interesting to find out what the Aboriginal people believe and, on reflection, coming from a Christian background we have to admit that there are also a lot of stories in the Bible (especially in relation to creation of the earth and its inhabitants) that are hard to take literally.

Later that morning we went over to have a look at Kata Tjuta (which used to be called the Olgas), another unusual rock formation in the same national park as Uluru.  We went for another short walk there, although by this stage it was getting extremely hot and the flies were out in huge numbers.  We retreated to the cool of the national park's visitor centre, which had some interesting information about the local wildlife and ecosystems as well as the Aboriginal culture.  That afternoon, the weather made a dramatic about-turn and there was a heavy rainstorm.  It was beautiful to see how the texture of the rock looked completely different when wet and we even saw some small waterfalls pouring down its sides.

Next morning, we got a bit of a surprise when we woke up - the temperature was below 18 degrees!  It was a long time since we had experienced weather like that and it felt very strange to be putting on warm clothes!  We drove to King's Canyon as planned and took advantage of the unusually cool weather to do the fairly strenuous walk around the rim of the canyon.  This gives you some great views over the canyon and a chance to see some of its unusual rock formations up close.  We also got to see a kangaroo really close!

From King's Canyon, we took the Mereenie Loop Road to the western end of the West MacDonnell Ranges.  This is well known for being a really badly corrugated dirt road and we'd have to agree as it's the worst we've ever driven.  The scenery was quite good though and we saw some wild horses and wild camels.  Entering the West MacDonnells, we stopped at Redbank Gorge - only Michiel and Lizzy made it to the gorge itself as most of the path seemed to have been washed away and Roel's flip-flops weren't quite up to the job.  Next stop was Glen Helen Gorge, where, again, the water levels made it impossible to get close to the gorge.  We camped for the night at Ormiston Gorge, which is a lot more accessible and has a great swimming hole.  We met a nice Swiss couple travelling in a converted Toyota Landcruiser and spent a pleasant evening chatting to them.

On the way back to Alice Springs the next day, we stopped at Ellery Creek Big Hole, where Lizzy and Michiel had a swim, and Simpson's Gap.  We checked back into the same campsite, which was getting pretty familiar by now (we even had the same space!).  Next day Frank and Martine (fellow overlanders, whom we travelled with in India, Pakistan and Nepal) arrived.  The five of us spent the next two weeks travelling together.  We started out in a festive mood, as our first full day together was Lizzy's birthday.  Even though it was pretty cold and rained on and off all day, we had a fun day, with bunting, birthday cheesecake (with candles!) and dinner (and drinks!) at Bojangles outback saloon!

The following day, we set out late as Lizzy had a translation to do (using Frank and Martine's car as an office - thanks guys!).  We made it as far as Wycliffe Well that night and camped at the roadhouse there, which is famous as the site of many UFO sigh