We were camped quite near the highway and
we throughout the night we could hear road trains coming for a minute or two
before they actually came past. The noise would gradually get louder and then
it would be like an aeroplane going past, and then it would recede over the
next couple of minutes. It wasn’t too disturbing though, there weren’t a lot of
them and in between it would be completely quiet.
I was up in time to see the sunrise, I went
down to the river and watched it slowly come to light and enjoyed the
reflections in the water and the incredible peacefulness. I saw a few tour
buses pass over the bridge on their way to Uluru – would have been an early
start from Alice Springs! As the morning went on we saw many army trucks going
south, big trucks carrying lots of supplies – and 2 of them were carrying
tanks! That was pretty exciting to see.
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| Early morning on the Finke River |
As we were packing up the tent we found a
tiny scorpion inside it, running along the floor near the wall. We all watched
him for a while, then I scooped him up in a cup (I did squish one of his
pincers as I tried to catch him) and threw him outside (away from the tent). We
chatted to our friends about the Ernest Giles track (I was thinking we might
leave the trailer and just drive back in the 16km to see the meteorite crater)
and they said it was the worst road they’d ever driven on, corrugated all the
way with no respite. We decided to give it a miss, if they struggled in their
huge 4WD. The other couple had broken several things on their van and both of
them said everything they had was covered in red dust.
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| An extra camper in our tent |
The kids wandered off to explore while we
finished packing, then I went to take them down to the river while Tony put the
last things on the top of the trailer. I found them talking to another family,
a mum with 2 boys. We chatted for ages, and Tony joined us after a while with
everything packed up and trailer attached and ready to go. Eventually I took
all 5 kids down to the river, the water was beautiful and they were soon all
completely wet (in their clothes, but since it was a hot sunny day, and fresh,
flowing water, I wasn’t worried). They played in the water and in the sand,
which was a bit like quicksand in parts, it was easy to sink in up to the knee.
I waded around a bit then found a shady place to sit and watch them and enjoy
the location. Tony joined me after a while and then the other mum and we
chatted and the kids played for a couple of hours. It was a pretty magical way
to spend the morning.
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| Swimming and exploring the sand in the Finke River |
We got everyone out of the river and headed
off around 1pm. We’d planned to stop at Stuarts Well for fuel and lunch, but
the kids had had a sandwich before we left and Tony and I were happy eating in
the car, and we had enough fuel to get to Alice Springs, so decided not to
stop. There was a camel farm though that the kids wanted to see, so we pulled
in to check out the camels, and an emu who was being amorous with the fence, a
dingo on a chain and some birds. Not the greatest animal place we’ve seen so
far.
There were several ranges of hills that we
drove past before reaching the McDonnell Ranges and then Alice Springs – a bit
different seeing many hills after so much flat land. We drove in to Alice
Springs through a gap in the ranges and it was exciting to be here. We checked
out a campground which was only $11 a night, but none of us felt comfortable
there and the reviews we read were very mixed so we decided against it. We were
stopped by the police on the way in, who asked if we were going to the bottle
shop or the campground – later when I saw police checking ID outside liquorland
at Coles we realised that the police check ID before anyone goes into a bottle
shop. I hadn’t seen that anywhere before.
We drove up Anzac Hill – a lookout over the
city – to rest for a bit and figure out where we would stay. It was a cool
place to get a bit of an idea of the layout of the town, and the kids thought
we were going to physically look for caravan parks from up there – we did it the
digital way however. There was a place out of town where we wanted to stay, we
rang them but they were full, so we found a place in town that seemed all right
and not too expensive. It seemed nice when we arrived, nothing special – it’s a
fairly basic caravan park with everyone laid out in a neat grid, not much atmosphere
but clean and quiet and a good place to rest for a few days.
I crashed when we arrived. Last time I
arrived in Alice Springs I was overwhelmed and a bit teary and wasn’t sure what
I wanted to do – I thought that was because I’d just been on a 20 hour bus ride
from Darwin. But this time I felt exactly the same. It’s an odd place – part city,
part country town, part regional centre, part cultural and arts centre, part
violent and unsafe, part touristy, part multicultural, it’s hot and dry and
sometimes stifling, it’s a remote town but so full of tourists that it doesn’t
feel remote – I am reading Tracks by Robyn Davidson (a lady who came to Alice
Springs, learned about camels and rode a camel train from here to the Indian
Ocean) and she says that having the ranges so close to town drives everyone a
bit crazy and I see what she means.
Tony recognized that I was not coping well
so he sat me down and made me a cup of tea before we set the tent up. The kids
explored the park a bit and eventually I was up to helping set up. We used the
free wifi for a bit, I sorted out my washing, and then we went for a swim in
the pool. The water was freezing and I just had a quick dip before I got out,
Tony stayed to supervise the kids and I went to Coles to stock up on much
needed supplies, and got a hot chicken for dinner. I enjoyed driving around the
town and discovering where things were, I even went over the river to get some
hot chips to have with our chicken (there are Indian food places everywhere
here, but only 1 fish and chip shop. Shopping in Coles felt like shopping in
Griffith, very multicultural and the food options available reflect that.)
We were in bed pretty early, read for a
while then off to sleep, keen for a quiet relaxing day tomorrow.
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