Kings Canyon to Alice Springs

It was not realy easy to leave Kings Canyon having met so many nice people there. In the morning we had a real photo shooting (back home some of them will show the pics of those two crazy people cycling in Australia;-), people came to say good bye.

We have started to cycle the Mereenie Loop, we needed a permit for that, since the road goes through the aboriginal land. And that is what we saw: the way goes all the red road down there!

The road was quite...well 154km of gravel road with currigations like hell... Have a look at this short movie, we think it gives the „spirit“ of our 2 cycling days very well;-)

Even though the road was very hard for us to cycle, we were very happy to be there because of the magnificent landscape.

In the evening of the first day, after 82km being shaked thousands of times, we decideeing shaked thousands of times, we decided to stop in the bush (this decisoon was an easy one, there was again nothing else around). Quickly we found out, that this is wild horses territorry! There were 15? 20? of them passing us by, and both parties had a look what the others want from them. 

Wild horses are called brombies here

A donkey was also there

Later that evening a dingo visited us and wanted to steal one of Peters front penniers, but we manage to scare him away.

Second day the road got even worse!! We were very lucky to carry less water the whole day, since we knew, that two tourists from Germany, Ruediger and Henriette will start driving the same road one day after us amd they will bring us a few liters of water supply. In such road conditions every kilogram counts.

While we were having a coffee break and 50km in the legs we saw a known car!Yeah! It is them. 

Water supply backup

Not only we got water supply, they also got us 2 cans of Coke! a chocolate, 2 oranges and a tin of fish. We were delighted! And believe it or not, after the break the road got better, and the last 26km that they were quite okay and we were able to camp already outside the gravel road.

In the night of this very cold night (2 degrees C) we suddenly heard wild horses running around VERY close to our tent. Strange feeling being in the tent, 4 oclock in the morning and there are many big animals outside... Luckily they were more afraid of the situation then we did, and run away...

The next morning the landscape changed again. It was very pleasant up and down cycling on a bitumin road. No gravel, no shaking, yeah!

The hill in the background is a meteor crater of 5km diameter! Gosse Bluff

We go to our goal at Glen Helen, beautiful outback resort and styaed there for 2 nights eating burgers, dringink Coke, just resting after the Mereenie Loop.

Jodi we met at the campground prepared a lovely breakfast for us!

Peter got in very close touch with a Gala parrot.

Since there is a lovely Gorge, Glen Helen Gorge, we had a look there as well of course.

We scared some bulls away...

In general the West MacDonnel Ranges is an outback experience in the Central Australia that we would not like to miss. It is amazing how green it is, and it is all surrounded by the desert! Lovely geological formations, water holes, gorges, simply great!

Ellery Creek Waterhole

Our last stop before we got to Alice Springs is Reedy Waterhole. In order to get there we cycled 5km in a river bed. Very rough cycling, sand, stones, yeah, dry river;-)

And the surprise of the day was, the waterhole was dry... so no swimming today... Anyway we enjoyed staying in this place a lot and spent a great relaxed day there.

Firewood collection outback style

Daily dealing with the flies

Coober Pedy to Uluru (Ayers Rock) to Kings Canyon

After 4 days of rain we were finally able to get on the road again. We knew we have about 400km to go on the Stuart Highway, which is quite busy, since it is the south-north connection. Luckily for us the cars give us enough space and even the road trains give us a hub to get off the road if necessary.

Only the flies are getting more and howling dingos at night let us know we are not alone.

First days we had quite a head wind and we were happy to meet Collin and his dog Tommy Rough the 2^nd day after CP, an australian mate with a vw bus who offered us to share his camp fire at the Agnes Creek, warm water for a bush camp shower and fresh milk. Later this evening he even offered us some potatoes and since we eat spaghetti or rice most of the time, we were glad to accept his offer. 

We passed some Road Houses on our way, they all have a special rough outback atmospehere. If we did not stay for the night, we always stopped for a coffee and a muffin.

In the meantime we cycled 400km to get to the border with the NorthernTeritorry, and stopped to have a look at the rest area direcly on the border and then Peters bike fall down: the bike stand broke down! We tried to fix it, but it can only handle the weight of the bike itself without any luggagge... From now on, any time we stop, Peter has to lay the bike or let Doro hold it while packing up. Maybe in Alice Springs we will get the chance to buy a new one... Only 600-700km until we get there, to the closest bike shop, so easy ;-) Later that day Peter got a puncture, our bush camp was full of some cactus-like grass and we rode through quite a few of them... We recognized it once we wanted to walk barefeet ;-)

In the morning we had a good coffee in Kulgera Roadhouse and finally the wind changed and we had a tale wind. This lasted for the next 300km until we got to the Uluru on the Lasseter Highway. 

The road from Stuart Highway to Uluru goes all the way up and down, you can see trees, orange dunes and dunes and trees and grass and that is why it is really amazing to see a rock like thos after 180km of grass and tree and dunes. 

And that is how we get water on the road, luckily there are water tanks which are located from time to time in the National Park. Once we spot one, we fill our water bottles.

btw: The rock is not Uluru! This one is still about 100km away!! But Mount Connor is amazing as well. There are even helicopters landing on it... One of these many touristic attractions around here, you could perfectly live without...

After we have arrived to Yulara, the touristic town before entering the National Park, we first had a coffee, 5 donuts!! together and checked out the super market. We decided to stay a day in the Resort and have a rest after reaching our goal Uluru, 700km cycling from Coober Pedy in only 8 days.

We had a nice walk to a few lookouts and to a camel farm and relaxed.

The next day we cycled into the National Park to Kata Tjuta (The Olgas) which was 50km ride.

We stayed a few kilometeres outside the Nationak Park and camped there for 2 days and had great walks and a really good camping spot with a view sunset on the Kata Tjuta.

 

 

As we were keen on seeing the sunrise at the Uluru (Ayers Rock) we got up 2 days later at 3! o´clock in the morning, started cycling in the dark! 

We hit the road in the morning still in the dark and had an amazing view of the milky way, scorpio and 2 falling stars. Still, we had to cycle almost 55km before the sun came! Luckily we managed to see the amazing sunrise, but it was very cold!!

Our fingers almost frozen we got a coffee in the Uluru Cultural Centre and were the first customers that day at 7:50 in the morning;-)

After the coffee we spent the complete day at the Rock and learned about the cultural meaning and importance of Uluru to the Aborigines.

Just have a look. It was an amazing (long) day!

 

Next day we took off towards Kings Canyon, which is 304km away from Uluru. These 3 days we spent on cycling, bush camping and watching the stars.

The day before arriving to the Kings Canyon in the morning we niticed that our camping mats were flat... After a while we have realized, that we put the whole tent on a cactus-like grass and our matresses did not like it at all...

Just before entering the Kings Canyon Resort, we have reached our 4000!!! kilometers on our trip!! Amazing!

Kings Canyon is beautiful. We made a 6 kilometer walk today and to see the sunrise we got up at 5:-) we got a lift to the Walk from 2 lovely people, Sydneysiders and we spent almost the whole day with them.

Waiting for the sun to come

Tomorrow we are heading off towards Alice Springs, mainly on a dirt road, having ca. 350km ahead!

As you can see we rode already a bit towards Alice