Back To Civilization!

Everyone like my new blog header? My brother made it for me. :)
(www.ryanharringtonphotography.com)

So after a scorching 5 days in the outback it's nice to be back in a city. And away from the flies!! Anyway, getting ahead of myself.

After my last entry I headed up to Cairns and stayed there for a few days. That was where I accomplished my second Australia goal - to dive the Great Barrier Reef. It was so completely awesome!

It was about an hour and a half cruise to the outer edge of the reef, and we had 5 hours out there. I did two dives and one snorkel and saw the most abundant variety of fish and coral I've ever seen. And also the hugest fish, probably about 4 feet by feet. Crazy. And I didn't get to see a reef shark even though some others did, but our group found a turtle and it let us get really close! I was so happy about that because I had really wanted to see one. Saw some more Nemos and even a Dori! Pretty cute. Saw a small stingray as well and just a whole bunch of funny looking fish. The company was great, the boat was nice and the dives were spectacular. I had a great day!




The next day I just walked around Cairns and relaxed and went to the park on the water's edge and read my book. I love how all the cities here devote their city waterfront land entirely to public use with parks and boardwalks and beaches. All of them are beautiful!




The next day I got my flight out to Alice Springs, smack in the middle of the country and the outback, and the jumping off point for my three day outback tour. I haven't been up before dawn that many days in a row in my whole life! We left Alice Springs at 6am on the first day and drove out to Uluru, Ayers Rock for a walk around the base and visit to the cultural center there. Then we stuck around to watch sunset on the rock which is supposed to be awesome, but it just got a little redder in my opinion.... Same with the next morning for sunrise. Nothing amazing, but it was still a pretty cool experience.


Sunset

And sunrise

On the second day we drove out to Kata Tjuta for a morning walk through the Olgas, which are a bunch of rocks pushed out of the earth like Uluru. It was nice to do that walk in the morning because it is sweltering hot out there at midday. Talking over 40 degrees.... Not my style! I swear I spent half my time out there putting on sunscreen!



After that we drove to our next campsite near Kings Canyon and had the evening to relax. There was a pool at our campsite which was totally refreshing, and then that night we cooked our dinner on coals from the campfire. Both nights we rolled out our swags and slept under the stars, which was absolutely breathtaking. I never knew there were that many stars. Just being so far away from any cities brings out the tiniest ones all over the place. The Milky Way was a huge white line across the center of the sky, and I was in heaven just laying in my swag and staring up for hours before I finally went to sleep.




The last day we got up really early again to go start our hike through Kings canyon before the sun came up and it got really hot. Our tour guide said she's taken groups on that hike when it's been 46 degrees out. I was really glad it was only 20 for us when we started before 7am! It was a really cool three hour hike and had some great views of the canyon, and a beautiful little water hole at the bottom.



After that it was a long haul bus ride back to Alice Springs. Along the way we stopped at a camel farm that has racing camels that you can ride. Totally did it. It was pretty fun - like riding a horse but way higher off the ground. Australia is the only country to actually have wild camels, and people here catch them for sale to Africa and other places.


A sign on the side of the road warning for camels. If you want a good laugh look really closely at the sign....

That night we ended our tour with dinner and some drinks at the bar back in Alice Springs. It was a fun night and it was too bad our trip was over because we all had finally gotten to know each other! But I had to leave (relatively) early because I had another tour to catch at 6 in the morning the next day.

My next tour was from Alice Springs down to Adelaide. It turned out to be not so much of a tour just driving right down... 1500km in two days in the back of a jeep with 6 other people was not so fun... But was fun was that we stopped in Coober Pedy for a night, which translates into "white man's burrows." In Coober Pedy they live underground because it can reach temperatures of over 55 degrees in the summer time. Underground houses stay a comfortable 22-24 degrees all year round, and who wouldn't love the complete darkness and silence for sleeping at night! We got to stay the night in an underground apartment and got a tour of an opal mine which is what makes the area so famous. That was pretty awesome.



Underground entrance and inside of a sample home

My trip through the outback was fun and I made some good friends, but my goodness I don't want to do that again! I almost died with the heat, and the infernal flies were nonstop buzzing around your head and face and never left you alone! I can't understand how people can live out there and put up with that all the time! 5 days was enough for me! But it was really cool and I had a good time and I'm glad I did it.

So now I'm down in Adelaide and I'm here for a few days. My next stops are Melbourne and Canberra, then back to Sydney to fly out for Singapore.

Tootles all!