Alice Springs

18-Jun-2007

Alice Springs

Sunday - 20^th June

Departed Kings Canyon at about 9:00am and headed for Alice Springs. ULP was $1.37/litre, most expensive so far. Travelled with Bruce and Elaine and as soon as we got CDMA coverage booked into the MacDonnell Range CP. We got the last sites. Forgot about NT school holidays. Arrived at the park around 4:00PM set up had a beer and settled down for a bit of a rest. We are booked in for 10 days.

Monday - 21^st June

Monday dawned sunny and clear but very cold. 0C overnight. The wind was pretty chilly.
Walked around town, did a bit of shopping to restock the food stores. Found a crack in the sway bar attachment on the hitch and took it to get repaired. Also found an Internet Cafe "The Todd Internet Cafe" that would let me attach my laptop to their broadband network for $4 hour. Great for updating my web site.

Wednesday - 23^rd June

Another quiet day around Alice. Did some shopping, got some new clothes. Just veged out.

Thursday - 24^th June

Spent the day at the Alice Springs Desert Park. What a great place. The "Birds of Prey" display was spectacular, but the highlight was Vincent, a local aboriginal elder, who demonstrated and explained the medicinal uses for a lot of local plants. He also told us stories explaining the history of his people and of the surrounding land. He was marvellous, I could have listened to him all day.
At sunset we fed the Rock Wallabies that came down from the crags behind Heavitree CP.

Saturday - 26^th June

Climbed up to the lookout behind the Heavitree CP, halfway up the Ghan arrived from Adelaide, got some great shots of it going through the Heavitree Gap and also scared up some kangaroos that were grazing on the slopes. View from the top across Alice Springs was spectacular, worth the climb. The kangaroos scared us up on the way down, suddenly popping up just ahead of us.
Did a bit of shopping and wandering around town including going up to Anzac Hill.
Went to Oscar’s, in Todd Mall, for dinner with Bruce and Elaine, great food and big servings.

Monday - 28^th June

Minus 2C overnight but warmed up to a beautiful day. Went down to the railroad track to watch the longest Ghan to date go through the Heavitree Gap. 47 carriages, a really big one, took ages to go past. Had a quick lunch then went out to the Artilunga Historical Reserve for the afternoon. Lots of ruins associated with the mines. We went into the Great Western Mine hoping to strike it rich, but no luck. The local pub had unfortunately closed, cause it looked like a great spot for a drink.

Tuesday - 29th June

Quiet day round the camp. Bit of shopping, then off to see the latest Harry Potter movie.

Wednesday - 30^th June

Up early and off to Gemtree to catch up with John and Margaret. Great caravan park up there. We all went out to the zircon diggings and watched the fossickers at work. Looked like good fun. We went back to the CP and bought a wheelbarrow of garnet "stuff". We spent the rest of the afternoon sifting it for garnets. Got lots of little chips and about a dozen good gem sized ones that we'll have cut and set when we get back home. It was a great day.

Thursday - 1st July

Stayed around Alice, did some shopping, all the washing, amazing how it stacks up. The CP built a huge bonfire to celebrate Territory Day so we went over with our sparklers. Great fun, lots of fireworks.

Friday - 2^nd July

Lovely warm day. Spent the day at the Alice Springs Show. All the usual stuff, arts and crafts, agricultural equipment displays, line dancers, livestock, sideshows, rides, show bags and arena events. A great example of a bush agricultural show. We had a great time. It got fairly hot and dusty in the afternoon so back to the park for a few convivial wines with Vic and Angie next door.

This site was last updated 18-06-07