Alice Springs

Arrived at Alice Springs Sunday about 4 pm, tried to book into the Family Parks caravan park, and they had no powered sites left, this turns out to be a blessing in disguise, our second choice was the Big 4 Macdonnell Range caravan park and it is one of the best parks we have stayed in ( would strongely recommend this to anyone).
First morning was -2 degrees ice everywhere through to a maximum 19, sunny skies, The Alice is a very strikiing town, wide streets, tidy, not what we thought it would be like.
We did a tour of  The School of the Air and watched teachers and students doing their lessons, very impressed. We also went to the Royal Flying Doctor for another tour, again this was very impressive,
from early childhood we have heard of these outback organisations and to see them working in real life was great. We also went to Anzac Hill lookout which gave scenic views of town.
Today we went to the Ghan Train museum to see the old Ghan Engine, old dining cars etc.
Also the Botanic gardens, Adelaide House which was the first Hospital.
Tomorrow we head towards Tennant Creek.

Inside Flying Doctors Aircraft

Alice from Lookout

Old Ghan

Old Ghan Dining room

Adelaide House

Uluru & Kings Canyon

 Mt Connor

We crossed over to the Northern Territory, went through our schedule stop at Marla as there was no head winds, and could maintain good speed. We stopped at Erldunda over night, and then on to Ayers Rock Resort, first big Rock we saw we throught it was Uluru turns out to be Mt Connor (known as foolaru) you will see the difference. We drove through Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park to the Kata Tjuta (the Olga's)

 Olgas

We also did a sunset tour of Uluru, See the changing colours of Uluru

Today (Friday) we were up at 3-45am to go on tour to Kings Canyon, we did the base walk

Instead of doing the rim walk of 3 hours we chose to do the scenic helicopter flight over the Kings Canyon and Gorges

No plans for tomorrow rest day sounds good, then Sunday we are off to Alice Springs.

Coober Pedy

Arrived at Coober Pedy early afternoon,after fighting head winds again, the last 20kms of the journey to Coober Pedy the landscape was dotted with mounds of dirt where miners have staked their claims to dig for Opals and make their fortune. The population is about 3000 but there is only about 100 houses above ground the rest are underground.

We visited the Old Timers Mine, This mine was first mined in 1916, where you can see good quality Opal seams, Opalised sea shells in the roof, they really did it tough in those days with hand digging,  not like today where machinery is lowered into the mine to cut through the sandstone base.
Monday still in Coober Pedy, we did a 3 hour guided bus tour of town, Serbian Church, another mine,

Serbian Church

View from lookout

Roof in Church

Golf Course

Underground picture theatre and open air drive inn. Went passed the golf course where a sign was strategically placed advising everyone to keep of the grass although there was no grass to be seen, putting surface was sand and sump oil, coloured balls are used as you would loose sight of them on the white rocky fairways. Visited an underground house looks similar to most houses except there is no windows, the temperature under ground is a consistently even temperature all year not withstanding the outside temperature can vary from Zero to 55 degrees depending on the time of year.

Woomera

Arrived at Woomera, after fighting gale forced winds, which caused us to use almost twice as much fuel.
Checked into the caravan park, which was situated 10 minutes walk from town.
We walked into what appeared to be a deserted town. In the town was a number of museums representing Australian, Japanese and English misile launching bases and also the Australian misile defence ranges.

There was very little if nothing mentioned about the 1950's atomic bomb blasts. We saw old rockets, misiles and planes in the museum, 60 % of the houses are unoccopied.
Each afternoon at 4PM the Caravan Park opened up a Bar where all guests were welcome, the Bar was called Cudgee, almost all guests came along.

We tried to keep off the main highway as much as possible by using secondary roads thus avoiding many semi's.
We went through a quaint little town which reminded Warren of King Gee overalls the town was called Yakka (Hard). You could have fired a cannon down the main street and no one would have heard it.
We then continued down through the southern parts of the Flinders range into the Clare Valley, passing familar vineyards like, Taylors, Morrisons, Yaldara and of course Clare Valley, then into Port Pirie where we visited the museum, and memorial gardens, and had lunch at Barnacle Bills restaurant which was Port Pirie's oldest stone church.

wazza & lozza Darwin/Broome trip

First night we ended up at Gundagai, 393 kms. On way to Gundagai it rained, Ah! we thought not again as it rained most of our trip to Cape York. We changed plans for accommodation and stayed at the undercover caravan park. Traffic noise kept Warren awake most of the night.
Day 2 we set off for Hay 342 kms. Via Wagga Wagga, Narrandra, again showers, then into Hay, we stayed at the big 4 caravan park Hay for 1 night stopover.
Day 3 we decided to drive into the town of Hay to check out the Motel we baby sat during our relief motel work.
then  off to Mildura continuing on the Hay plains. We past a siding called Hells Gate, which reminded Warren of Banjo Patterson's poem, please deliver me from Hay, Hell and Booligal. Flat grounds, no trees, the odd cattle and sheep grazing then after crossing the mighty Murray River into Mildura. What an impressive town at first sight tree lined wide streets, and no rain, we decided to stay an extra day and booked into the Big 4 cross roads caravan park.
Saturday we decided to go on the Paddle Steamer for a trip down the Murray and through Lock 11. We boarded the Rothbury Paddle Steamer selected front seats with a great view, pulled out from the jetty heard a bang, broken rudder cable, back to the jetty, received a refund and disembarked.
Went to the tourist information centre which is the best one we have ever seen.
Sunday we finally took the Murray River cruise, which we enjoyed, this time it was on a different paddle steamer "Melbourne"

Wazza & Lozza's trip to Darwin, Broome

Well we are off to another adventure starting 11th May, 2011
We will try to make this blog better than the last one.