Trip to Central Australia - Photos from Uluru, Kata Tjuta and Kings Canyon

Matthew and I had an excellent trip to "The Red Centre." We flew to Alice Springs, stayed one night and were picked up at 6 am the next morning by our tour company, Intrepid Connections, for the 3-day "Central Rock and Canyon" tour.

The drive from Alice Spring to Uluru is long - 5 hours (including lots of toilet/petrol stops). Our first stop was at the Outback Camel Farm, for a quick camel ride. It was quite bumpy when the handler told them to run!

Stop 2 was at the Erldunda Roadhouse for petrol, toilet, coffee, etc. They have a giant frill neck lizard and a giant echidna in a covered area, which are from some Expo in the 1980s.

After a few more stops, including one on the side of the highway to gather firewood, we finally arrived at our permanent campsite, which has canvas safari-style tents, and a big screened in cookhouse, which was nice, as the flies in Central Australia are annoying. For lunch, our camp host made us quiche and salad. (We were prepared to help with cooking and dishes, but the hostie and the guide did everything and didn't want help!)

our campsite

Matthew and "the bus"

After lunch, we went to the Cultural Centre at the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, for a little introduction to the area, and then we were on our way for our base walk to get up close to Uluru. We did the Mala Walk (mala means rufous hare-wallaby), where we saw caves and rock formations. Our guide, Craig, was excellent and told us all sorts of information, including the Aboriginal names and cultural significance of things.

Craig talking about the Teaching Cave and its drawings

We drove to another side of Uluru to go to the Mutitjulu Waterhole, which was awesome. That side of Uluru was not in direct afternoon sun, so cooler, and with the waterhole, there were more trees and birds there. It was so peaceful at the waterhole.

Finally, it was back in the bus to drive to our sunset viewing area for sparkling wine and watching the sunset.

On the drive back to the campsite, we pulled over to get a photo of the sliver of the Moon and Venus.

Dinner was an Aussie BBQ with beef and kangaroo steak, and camel sausages. Apparently with 1 million wild camels in Australia, they're trying to do something with all the camels, and are encouraging people to eat camel!

The next morning, we woke up at 5 am and had breakfast (so nice to have the hostie cooking for us) before heading out to Kata Tjuta for our sunrise walk. (At 6:15 am, we were in the bus waiting at the National Park gates for them to open and let us in.) The Valley of Winds Walk at Kata Tjuta is so lovely, and possibly my favorite walk of the whole trip, although they were all so different, it's hard to compare. It's also nice because the wind kept the flies away!

Setting out before sunrise 

Craig explaining the geologic formations of the area

We spotted a Euro!

After the 7.4 km Valley of the Winds Walk, we drove around Uluru a bit more, including a stop at a different viewing area, where you can take a panorama of both Kata Tjuta and Uluru. However, Uluru is 3 km away!

After lunch at our campsite (camel burgers), we drove several hours to our campsite at Kings Canyon. Dinner was macadamia chicken curry and rice, and chocolate cake for dessert. After dinner, Craig played us some didgeridoo and also made us Aussie damper in the campfire.

He offered swags to anyone who wanted to sleep out under the stars, and a few people, including Matthew, took him up on it, while the rest of us slept in our tents.

The next morning, we were up at 4:30 am to have breakfast before starting out before sunrise for the 6 km Kings Canyon Rim Walk. I've never started hiking in the complete darkness before! As we were hiking, early morning light started peeking out, which was really cool, but it was chilly while we were waiting at the viewing area at the top for the sunrise to warm us up!

We passed through "Priscilla's Crack," which was seen in the film "Priscilla Queen of the Desert." In fact, the whole Kings Canyon is in the scene below.

Adam Climbs a Mountain
The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert — MOVIECLIPS.com

Here's us at the top, towards the end of our walk.

Finally, we had lunch at the campsite, then back in the bus for the long drive back to Alice Springs. We were really grateful for Craig, who besides being a cheerful and knowledgeable guide, also did all the driving.

Back in the Alice, we were dropped off at our various hotels, and luckily one of them was Heavitree Gap Outback Lodge, which is right at the base of the MacDonnell Ranges. Black-flanked rock wallabies come down at sunset for food pellets (sold at Reception).

We stayed one last night at our hotel in the Alice, then we flew out the next afternoon (only one flight per day to Sydney on Qantas).

It was really a great trip, and we were glad the tour worked out so well. Here's the album with the rest of our photos from the trip.

Central Australia Trip - Uluru, Kata Tjuta and Kings Canyon

P.S. We spotted less wildlife than we expected on this trip. Most animals in the area really do hide out during the heat of the day. But even when we were out driving before sunrise, we still only spotted 2 roos. Anyway, here's a list of all the wildlife we spotted:

galah, hawk/eagle with a V tail (not a wedge-tailed eagle), Corella (white parrot), Willie Wagtail, red kangaroo, ants, flies, thorny devil, dingoes, Euro/wallaroo, black-flanked rock wallaby, emu, camel, brumby.

Moving Internationally 2010 - How it went down

Now that we'll be doing the international move in reverse, I thought I'd review my old blog posts to see how it really happened to refresh my memory. The moving company did a pretty good job of explaining everything, but not everything went down as planned.

The ship with our container didn't go directly from Seattle to Sydney as scheduled. For some reason, it stopped in Singapore and everything was delayed for three weeks while awaiting a connecting vessel. That meant we went from being without our stuff for 7 weeks to being without our stuff for 10 weeks.

Below is the move timeline, and at the bottom is a little "Lessons Learned" section! :)

30 September 2010
Shipment delivered to our apartment; first night sleeping in our own bed in 2.5 months.

15 September 2010
Our container arrived at Sydney Port on 15 September, and  the Port set the date of 18 September for Crown Relocation to collect the container in preparation for Quarantine inspection.

9 September 2010
Rental furniture delivered. The relocation company provided us with "furniture hire" because our shipment was inexplicably delayed by 3 weeks. They dropped off a bed with sheets and pillows, a loveseat, a coffee table, a few lamps, and box of kitchen goods. After I unpacked the boxes with the linens and kitchen stuff, I realized they forgot to give us the bath towels and all they included in the kitchen box was dishes - they didn't provide the basic kitchen supplies set with pots and pans, etc. So, still more eating out for us for a few more days!

8 September 2010
Picked up keys to our new apartment.

3 September 2010
Signed the lease on our new apartment.

25 August 2010
We inquired about our shipping container with all our worldly possessions, which was to have arrived in Sydney on 21 August. We were advised today that it is still in Singapore, awaiting a connecting vessel. (It was never supposed to go to Singapore, it was originally scheduled to go directly from Seattle to Sydney.)
Its revised estimated arrival date in Sydney is 13 September, making it 3 weeks late. Add onto that another 10 to 14 business days for our shipment to clear Australian Customs and Quarantine, and we may not be seeing our furniture and the rest of our clothes, etc until 27 September.
Our furnished corporate apartment only lasts 30 days, and the lease on any housing we've been looking at may not be able to be held off until the last week of September.

Tue 17 August 2010
We arrived safely at about 6:05 am. Going through Australian Customs and Quarantine was pretty quick - we were done by about 6:45 am.
Our wonderful friends Mark and Jennifer picked us up at the airport with a van for all our luggage, and drove us to our our hotel/furnished apartment in the CBD.

Sunday 15 August 2010
Woke up, deflated our Aerobed, and began the process of cramming all our clothes and things into our suitcases and small footlocker. It was stressful, but we got it all in!

12:30 pm: Our wonderful friends Tamara and Andy arrived in 2 cars to take us and our luggage to the airport. We checked 5 bags (including the footlocker), and had 2 carry-on items each. Luckily, M was Premier Executive with United Airlines, so we didn't have to pay any fees for that amount of luggage.

2:50 pm: flight from Portland to L.A.

5:00 pm: arrive LAX and had lunch/dinner before settling into the United Red Carpet Club lounge in LAX.

6:30ish: 2 comfy chairs, 2 laptops, 1 Ipod with a headphones splitter so we could share the music. We were provided only 1 complimentary wifi connection for the lounge, but M figured out how to share because he's smart and brought a network cable.

10:30pm departure for 14.5 hour flight from LAX to Sydney! We leave the USA at 10:30 on Sunday night and arrive in Sydney at 6:10 am on Tuesday!

Saturday 14 August 2010
Bon Voyage party at Weir Haus.

Sunday 1 August 2010
Moving Sale - got rid of almost all electric devices, except computery stuff that can switch voltages.

July 28 2010
We were notified that our 457 visas for Australia were approved, and we were finally able to book our flight! We leave for Sydney on August 15.

22 July 2010
The movers were at our house Thursday July 22 to pack and load everything we were taking to Australia into the 20-foot shipping container. Four guys arrived at 8:30 am, and they were all done by 4 pm! In the end, the container was only half-full, and it only took them one day. (They'd allowed for packing on Thu & Fri, but only needed Thursday.)
The shipping container AKA "the can" then goes from Portland to Seattle, and leaves on a ship out of the Port of Seattle on 31 July. It will arrive in Sydney on 21 August and then has to clear Australia Customs & Quarantine. We won't see our stuff until at least 9 September.
Note: we were sleeping on an Aerobed from 22 July until our departure on 15 August.

A Few Lessons Learned
Make the night before and day of departure easier for yourself.
It wasn't our greatest idea to have the going away party the night before we flew out. Waking up with a hangover and trying to cram everything into our suitcases was slightly unpleasant, but oh well! :P

Also in retrospect, I wouldn't have slept on the Aerobed in our house the night before we flew out. Would have been better to spring for a hotel room to reduce the stress of having to clear out every last item from the house before we flew out that day.

Don't leave lots of rubbish, and cleaning out the fridge, until right before you leave. 
How did we end up with so many condiments, and why did we leave cleaning out our fridge until the day before (or maybe it was the day before the day before) we left? I have a memory of standing at the kitchen sink dumping ketchup etc and frantically washing out the containers for the recycling, all while thinking of 100 other things I needed to be doing instead! I think we thought we would still be cooking at home til the end, but in reality, we were so tired from endless errands, house painting, etc, and having last dinners out with friends, that we didn't cook much that last week anyway.

Also, by the time we left, our garbage and recycling bins were overflowing. We should have been getting rid of more of our trash and recycling in the few weeks before our departure.

Don't be afraid to ask for help.
I remember the task list was endless. So many errands, so little time. One day, I sent out a frantic email to friends asking them to please help us by dropping stuff off at the Post Office, yet another trip to Goodwill, yet another trip to the Dump. Our lovely friends responded, and we were so grateful.

Don't allow clutter to accumulate in your basement.
How did we end up with a basement so full of styrofoam blocks and old packing peanuts? We had original boxes with styrofoam inside for appliances we hadn't owned in years! It took us half a day just to load up almost an entire van's worth and then drive out to the recycling center on the far side of town (as curbside recycling wouldn't take styrofoam). I'm glad we did it rather than chuck it all in the trash (and it wouldn't have all fit in our trash anyway), but that certainly took heaps longer than we expected!

Returning to the USA!

It's official -- after almost three years abroad, we're returning to the USA!

Matthew has signed a contract to relocate to the Mountain View, CA office, starting in October.

Our current plan is to leave Sydney at the end of August, and have the month of September for vacation time and moving (probably New Zealand and visiting family in various states). Then, he'll start at Mountain View office on 1 October.

We are, of course, sad that our Australian adventure is coming to an end, and excited and nervous about another big move. We're definitely looking forward being closer to family and friends in the States.

My new e-reader

I was wary for a long time about getting an e-reader, but I finally took the plunge and got a Kobo Aura HD. I went with Kobo (a Toronto-based, Japanese-owned company) because they support open standards for e-books, and I didn't want to be locked in to Amazon. I went with a dedicated e-reader with an E Ink display (as opposed to reading on a tablet), as I was concerned about eye strain.

As for reading experience, I don't have anything to compare it to, since this is my first e-reader. But I'm liking it, and I don't have any complaints just yet!

I've found the Kobo bookstore a bit clunky, but fine. I'm not sure if I'm just being harsh, or if it has something to do with the Australian version of the store being somehow deficient compared to the US/Canadian version.

My first e-book purchase was a compilation of the first three Miss Marple books by Agatha Christie. This is actually the first Agatha Christie novel I've read, and I'm quite enjoying it. (It's also something I knew I wouldn't feel the need to keep a physical copy of.)

Photos from the Great Gatsby Party

Last night we went to a Great Gatsby themed party at the Victoria Room. We had a great time - excellent people watching. And with gimlets and champagne all night, who can complain? ;)

Here's the album with the rest of our photos from the dapper evening.

Great Gatsby Party