We decided to take the more difficult route to Kings Canyon and set off. 2 km outside Alice, the tarmac road stops and it’s just one long unpaved road with potholes and corrugations through a harsh outback landscape.



For the record, the car we hired was a Toyota Rav 4 and it is without doubt, the worst four wheel drive car on the planet. It may be the worst car of any type. The steering wheel shakes, the car rattles, at more than 90km/h, it corners like it’s on casters. People in 20 year old Honda Civics were overtaking us on the inside and going round corners faster and more safely than we were in our “4×4″.

Anyway, after a fairly tense drive in the excuse for a four wheel drive vehicle, we ended up at the Kings Canyon Resort. Bascically there’s nothing at Kings Canyon except the Canyon and a “resort style” hotel. The hotel is…err…charming.

However, the canyon itself is exceptional. There’s two walks. One which walks up the canyon which is easy but fly ridden and a bit “ho hum”. We did that on the evening we arrived and were a bit disappointed. After a sumptious “international buffet style” dinner, we got up and attempted the canyon rim walk. There’s warning signs all over the place and they estimate that it will take four hours. Actually, it’s pretty easy and takes 2 hours. The scenery is oustanding.



Great blocks of sandstone laid down 400 million years ago cracked by being pushed up and then eroded into striated domes. The canyon isn’t much compared to the Grand Canyon but it still feels awfully high up on the edge. The canyon is also home to legacy plants which have survived from a time when Australia was much wetter. Interestingly, the red sandstone isn’t red! It’s white but the redness is caused by dust blowing on the rock and being chemically fixed there by microscopic lichen.

After the walk, we got straight into the awful car and drove out of King’s Canyon. Luckily the road turns into a tarmac road all the way to the Lassiter Highway which made driving a bit easier. Also, there was almost nobody on the road. Driving from Alice to Uluru was an excellent experience because it really gives you some idea of the scale of the country. Even once we got the the Lassiter Highway we still had over 100km to get to Uluru. We stopped for a “comfort break” at Curtain Springs which is one of the most isolated places I’ve ever seen. It’s at the center of a 1 million acre cattle station! There’s not much to see and not much to do except drink a coffee and eat a meat pie. There is a huge mountain south of it called Mt Connor which (to be honest) looks even more superb than Uluru.

Flew from Darwin to Alice Springs on a very nice Qantas flight across the “Red Center” of Australia. The view out of the window of the plane was quite extraordinary. It’s 1459km from Darwin to Alice and apart from the Stuart Highway and the Ghan Railway line, there’s absolutely nothing but red desert and the occasional geometrically straight track leading off into the wilderness.

In Alice, we checked into our “River View” rooms at the Alice Springs Resort which looked out over the Todd River. The view from our hotel balcony looks like this:



Every year they run the Henley on Todd regatta where the boats all have wheels. There’s a certain self deprecatory humour about Alice which is quite endearing. Of course, if you live at the end of civilisation, you have to have a sense of humour. To get into the spirit of the humour, I played my guitar (which has been carted around and played in various jungles and national parks) in the middle of the Todd River.



So, as you can see, it was a great idea to take the guitar. Extra points for anybody who can identify the song I’m playing….

Since we’re going to Chicago eventually, Isabelle thought she’d make a start on the 15749km from Alice to Chicago tonight…



We’re about to leave Alice to drive through the outback in our 4wd car towards Uluru (or Ayers Rock as it used to be known) and King’s Canyon. There’s two ways to go from Alice. The first is fairly simple and on tarmac roads; the other is off road and through some fairly hairy country. Guess which one we’re going for…..

We flew from Singapore to Darwin on a horrible overnight flight. When we got to Darwin at 4 o;clock in the morning we went to sleep and then explored Darwin during the day. There’s not much to do in Darwin but we did go to a marine centre which was billed as the “The Most Interesting Attraction in Darwin”. And, to be honest, it was. But it’s a nice sunny place and we had a good day wandering around. I bought a hat.



Bright and early the following morning we headed off to Kakadu National Park in a funny little van.



The park is outstanding. About the size of Switzerland and totally unspoilt. We drove through amazing bush scenery. We went to various sites of Aboriginal Art. The “original owners” have been living in Australia for 50,000 years and much of the art is more than 2000 years old.



After the rock art, we went on a river safari in the Yellow Water Wetlands. It’s absolutely beautiful.



but there are a lot of very very dangerous crocodiles



These “salties” (as the Saltwater Crocodiles are known) are incredibly dangerous and very very scary. Then again, almost everything in Australia is dangerous. If it’s not going to poison you to death, it’ll rip your arm off. Crocodile Dundee is pretty close to the truth. (Actually, we saw and swam in the rock pool that was called “Echo Pool” in the film and saw the famous buffallo “Charlie” who is standing stuffed in road side bar).
We were camping in some rather up-market tents



These tents were really nice but the mosquitoes were a problem. At the first campsite there were literally clouds of them. The food was cooked over an open fire and after dinner, Isabelle and I ate Green Ants for pudding. They taste lemony and as long as you bite down hard enough, they don’t bite your mouth.

The following morning it was off to some fantastic rock pools.



Despite the danger signs



we were assured that there weren’t any salties in the rock pools and we all went in for a very refreshing swim.



Apart from getting about a trillion mozzie and sand fly bites, we had a good time. Fantastic alien scenery, great wildlife, eating local Barramundi grilled on an open fire and experiencing the bush for a few days was a great introduction to Australia. Off to Alice Springs today and then we drive down the Stuart Highway to Ayers Rock from where the next blog entry will come.

There’s a new photo album on the web site which has some of the photographs from Borneo. It’s not the entire trip but it covers Singapore, Sepilok, Kuching and some of the caves in Mulu. There’s some more information on the caves on the web.