Half-lap Day 18: Uluru

I was up at 5.30 and some of the other campers were already leaving. The rest of the family got up at 6 and quickly ate some breakfast, I made tea and coffee for Tony and I and we were in the car by just after 6.30. The sky was beginning to lighten as we started to drive. Approaching Uluru, it was a black silhouette against the slightly orange background of the eastern sky – very very impressive. We bought our National Parks pass on the way (and were given an information sheet in German – could be handy if we want to learn some German on our trip) and kept driving around to the sunrise viewing area at Talinguru Nyakunytjuta (I might need to check the spelling of that!), watching the changing light on Uluru as we went.

There were already a lot of people there but the sun was still below the horizon. Uluru was quite visible now, still a dark brown mass rising out of the ground. We walked up to the main viewing platform but there were too many people there for me and the kids so we moved back down to one of the lower areas. It was exciting to watch the sunlight slowly hit different bits of the rock, and gradually light up the face of it. We could also see Kata Tjuta from here and they were lit with sunlight earlier than Uluru, quite impressive from a distance. While the sun was rising some of us noticed a kestrel fly into a nearby tree. Another, smaller bird (who may have had a nest in the tree) starting scolding the kestrel loudly. As we watched she moved closer and closer to the big bird, sounding warning calls the whole time, and eventually she started dive bombing the kestrel. It held it’s ground for a while (it seemed to just be ignoring the smaller bird) but eventually had enough and flew away, being chased for some time by the smaller bird, who kept diving at it the whole way – into another tree and down near the ground and eventually across the plains until the small bird was happy it was far enough away from her tree.

LiAM is happy that we gave him his birthday present early - he was very keen to get a photo of Uluru (or in this case, a photo of me taking a photo of Uluru...)

The kids and I wandered along the paths and watched the changing light from several different view points. The one we ended up at seemed to have the best view, on ground level, straight across to the rock. Many of the other vantage points had trees in our line of sight – which didn’t detract from how amazing the sunrise was. We eventually wandered back up to where Tony was, and found him chatting to a guy who used to supply presses to De Bortoli. Nearly everyone we’ve spoken to has lived near somewhere we used to live, or near some of our family, or works somewhere we’ve had something to do with… There’s always a connection.

Back at the carpark we were happy to find flush toilets – my worst ever toilet experience was a Uluru in 1997, so it was a relief to see that the toilets have been upgraded quite a bit since then! Once we’d used the facilities we drove all the way around Uluru – so amazing to see it from so many different angles. I’d forgotten how wriggly the outline is, I tend to think of it as just being a big oval. We stopped near the place where people can climb it (the climb was closed and we had no intention of climbing anyway) so the kids could get close to it. Then we popped around to the cultural centre as LiAM wanted to get a souvenir.

Caitlin and I spent quite a bit of time in the art gallery, watching two indigenous women painting – one woman was working on a dot painting that I loved more than anything else I’d seen in the gallery. I would have loved to buy it – someone else had already said they wanted, and it was a little out of my price range anyway. I could have stayed there all day watching them work. LiAM bought a little Uluru snow globe, and Millie bought a note book with a dot painting on the front, and Caitlin a scrunchie with a dot pattern on it. Tony bought an Uluru tea towel – we figure tea towels are handy and practical souvenirs! LiAM was eyeing off the cakes at the café – they were $6 a piece so I said we could buy a whole cake to share from the IGA later and it would probably be cheaper. He was happy to wait.

Back to the campground where I waited in line to find out the details of our new site. It was a good sized site (I’d been worried, some of the sites here are really narrow, and we wouldn’t be able to put our awing up), right near a toilet block, and with shade. We had a bit more to eat back at our tent, then started to do a weird sort of pack up – we put things away where we could, and shoved a heap of stuff in the car – it still took a while and it was a little frustrating to have to pack up so much to move such a short distance – but we needed to put the tent all the way down to move it. We didn’t put the cover on though, just piled everything on top of the folded tent and tied it down for the short drive. Tony and Caitlin had already ridden their bikes over and Caitlin helped Millie ride hers.

Setting up was also a bit of a pain since we normally have a break in between putting the tent down and back up again and we weren’t really in the mood. I hadn’t really eaten enough and I think the busyness of the last couple of weeks was catching up with me and I was rather grumpy. Everyone seemed tired so we decided to simply spend the rest of the day at the campground rather than going out for more sight seeing – sometimes we need to rest! We got everything set up and had some lunch, and I eventually got our washing hung out to dry. LiAM and I went to the IGA to get milk and cake and a few other supplies, which picked up everyone’s mood a little. After lunch Tony took the kids to have a swim and I stayed at the tent, catching up on some banking and email and so on, and enjoying the down time.

The kids came back and had showers and we had pizza rolls for tea (tomato paste, ham, kabana, cheese and pineapple wrapped up in flat bread and cooked in the fry pan). Not quite pizza but the closest we could get with the equipment we had! Everyone was exhausted, LiAM went to bed and listened to music before the rest of us wandered in and we read Brisingr for a very short time before people started falling asleep.

King Valley Trip -> Day 2

It was COLD in the tent overnight. Everyone was awake a few times, Millie moved up onto the bed with Tony and I, we redistributed blankets, had a few chilly toilet trips, lots of whispered conversations about how to get back to sleep. LiAM slept worst of all of us, and as soon as there was a tiny bit of light in the morning he and I got out of bed. We rugged up and went for a walk exploring the river - it was so beautiful with the autumn leaves and the early morning light.

LiAM and our favourite yellow tree on our early morning walk

Campsite in early morning

After our walk we got the fire going again and played cards for a while, then the others eventually emerged from the tent. We cooked crumpets and toast on our camp stove, and made a hot chocolate for everyone. The kids started to play on the slide - it was possible to slide down and stop at the bottom before going in to the river. Once the initial cold of the morning started to wear off, Caitlin wanted to go in the river. She and LiAM bravely got into their swimmers and tried the water - it was very very cold, which didn't deter them at all. They turned the water on on the slide, and slid into the river, and then tried the kayaks. It didn't take them long to get the hang of them, and they kayaked up and down the little area in front of our camp. Tony was going to have a go but the water temperature was even colder than he'd expected so he changed his mind. Millie wanted to try - she was in her swimmers and playing at the end of the slide - and she fell in, head first. I raced in to pull her out, but she was already upright and on her way out by herself - I was impressed. Having the fire going meant she could get warm and dry fairly quickly - she wasn't keen to go back in the water after that. Tony and LiAM searched for skimming stones and found quite a few that worked well.

Caitlin and LiAM kayaking in the river

Tony and I put up one of the annexes on the tent - with the chance of rain over the next few days we didn't want the inside of the tent getting wet. We hadn't used the annex before, so it took us a while to figure out how it all went together, although it wasn't difficult to put up once we worked it out. It was great to have a bit of extra covered space.

There was a house (where we stayed last time) not too far from our campsite, with a toilet we were welcome to use if we didn't want to use the portable. Tony and Caitlin had bought their bikes so they rode up there a couple of times, and I walked up once. It was also a handy place to recharge our phones when needed.

We pottered around the fire, in and out of the river, exploring the campsite, reading, doing puzzles and so on. In the afternoon the kids wanted to go out somewhere, and I really wanted a nap, so Tony and the kids went for a drive to Wangaratta (only about 25km away) and had some McDonalds, and I had a bit of a sleep. When they came back Tony saw and had a good chat with one of his old workmates from De Bortoli (he moved up to Tatong and now works at this vineyard sometimes). I woke up a bit groggy, sitting in the fresh air around the fire helped me pick up fairly quickly.

We cooked pasta and a tomato sauce for dinner and ate around the fire. LiAM fell asleep early when he went into the tent to get warm. The girls roasted marshmallows and after a while we all moved into the tent to try to get warm and get to sleep.

Ballarat Trip -> Day 2

Everyone slept quite well and stayed in their sleeping bags all night. I woke up and went to the kitchen for a cup of tea and realised that I hadn't bought my tea bags with me. I read my book for a while, and everyone else was up by about 8am. We had breakfast and the kids scooted around the park, played in the playground, jumped on the jumping pillow, watched some tv, while I got ready for our day. The park had a 4 seat pedal car for hire, so we had a go on that before we went out. Caitlin and LiAM were able to pedal when the ground was flat, it was much harder when going uphill though, so I walked behind them and pushed when necessary, and I did have a bit of a turn at pedalling as well. It was raining while we were pedalling and everyone we saw made a negative comment about the rain, but it didn't bother us.

Around 11am we walked over to Sovereign Hill. It had stopped raining by now though was still overcast. We bought our tickets (valid for 2 consecutive days) and got the last 4 tickets to the next night's Sound and Light show. Luckily. It would have been incredibly disappointing to miss out on the show entirely. We wandered around to the main street, looking into mining shafts on the way, then checked out the Blacksmiths, the horses in the stables, and the lolly shop - deciding to buy our lollies on our way out rather than carrying them around all day. For now, we bought horse head lolly pops and chocolate frogs with crushed raspberry drops in them (one each). We explored the hotel, then while Caitlin and LiAM went to see the horses pulling the carriage, Millie and I popped in to the Mechanics Institute where she found a display of precious gems and stones which was fascinating. We joined the others and met and patted the horses, then wandered down to the Red Hill Mine, where we did a self-guided tour - the lights and voices are automated and led us through the mine, with holograms in places showing men digging for gold. It was well done and showed a pretty vivid picture of what it was like in the mines. Once above ground again we headed for the gold diggings. We sat on a log and ate our lunch, in between panning for gold in the creek. I'd done it before and had a vague recollection of how to do it but wasn't having much luck. The kids chatted to a European couple next to us who had found a bit. A guy came over after a while and helped me with my method (although he wasn't too critical for my liking) and after that I found several small pieces of gold. Very exciting. Once I'd figured out how to do it, LiAM lined up pans for me to work through and I usually found a couple of pieces in each pan. Another guy came over and asked if he could check the pans I'd finished, and he found a couple more pieces which he let me have.

Caitlin at the stables

Millie panning for gold

LiAM with a gold ingot worth $149,000

We wandered back up the hill, stopped in at the confectionary factory and sampled the raspberry drops and discovered that they sold really big jars of them, then went up to the gold mine and paid for  a guided tour. A quick toilet dash and then down into the mine with a group and a guide. We went underground through pitch darkness on an inclined tram - a bit scary and also quite exciting. This tour talked more about how they went about finding gold and how the mine was structured, and the differences between company and independent mining. The guide asked lots of questions which the kids usually answered, although many of his questions were more aimed at tricking the audience, which I didn't like. There was a seam of real gold that had been placed in the mine, that was quite cool to see. We went on a small train through tunnels to get to the exit tram - a little like riding in mine carts which had a nice minecraft flavour! Back up on the tram, then we climbed the tower above the mine shaft - but it was quite high and the wind was strong and everyone freaked out a little so we went back down. There was a line of mine carts at the base so the kids played in them for a while - Millie in particular had been excited all day at seeing mine carts and realising that they really do exist, they are not just a minecraft creation.

Mine carts!

From there we went and saw a demonstration of real gold being melted down and poured to make an ingot. It was quite interesting and exciting to see the process, then everyone got to hold it. The ingot weighed 3kg and was worth about $149,000 - it felt SO heavy because it was small and dense. The guy who poured it was chatting to us and discovered we lived on a vineyard and that the kids' dad makes wine, so he declared himself Caitlin's best friend and wanted her to come back with wine... We went into the shop and looked at lots of items made of gold, and bought a personalised gold coin for the kids' friend who loves rocks and minerals and gold and was having a birthday this week (we got his name and birthday engraved on it, and a wooden stand to keep it in).

Up to the candle making shop from there, where we purchased plain white candles and the kids were able to dip them into dye and colour them. It was an amazingly simple but effective process, using 3 vats of dye, to create a candle with 5 different bands of colour on it. LiAM played with the colours a bit more than that, the lady warned him that he'd get brown, but he was happy to add a 6th brown band and was pleased with his result. We went to the bowling alley next and all had a go at old fashioned 9 pin bowling - it was fun although the ball was a bit heavy for Millie to bowl very far. We wandered back down the main street and stopped to buy our massive jar of raspberry drops (and a couple more chocolate frogs). From there we meandered down the rest of the street and then headed back to the caravan park.

Candle Dipping

The kids played with the kids in the caravan next to us, on the jumping pillow and in front of our tent and caravan. One of the boys had just turned 5, and he and Millie played with all their soft toys together. I had a hot chocolate and read my book, then went to get dinner ready. The group we'd met the night before were having a party in the camp kitchen - at least 25 people - and they were too loud for LiAM and Millie so I heated up our leftovers and cooked some noodles and we ate back at our tent. It was getting a bit chilly so the kids ate wrapped up in blankets. We had a shower after tea, Caitlin went to the ladies and the rest of us used the family bathroom. We watched TV until the TV room closed then went back to the tent and read Eldest for a while.