I left Cairns and flew to Alice Springs for a 4 day tour of Uluru, the Olgas and Kings Canyon. Oh my goodness nothing in the world could be quite like this place. You drive for hours and see nothing but a huge cartoon sky and red sand with a few bushes dotted about. After the fourth hour of nothing I really did wonder why I had wasted my time and money to go and see a big pebble. The rock itself is very impressive but I found myself finding people spotting much more fun. The first evening we went to watch the sun set over Uluru something the every tour does so after our guide told us to hurry up or we might not get a parking space we jumped on the bus and headed to the rather busy 'sunset viewing carpark'
I have never found something to funny in all my life and I luckily found myself in the company of a German with a sense of humour as we went off to do a spot of people watching. This is where the tour operators go to town and bring out the champagne and nibbles before the show starts, you could point out the more posh tours by the cut glass champagne flutes and the cheaper backpacker options with their plastic mugs. (I was more middle of the road with a bog standard glass and sparkling wine)
I was really lucky with my trip and because we were quite a small group, the first two nights we were upgraded to another trip which included someone to cook for us and tents with beds and fans. It was so hot that most days we had to get up before sunrise to enable us to do the walks, on one day it was 28 degrees when we started walking at 6.30 and nearly 40 when we finished at 10! I have never been so hot in all my life. I would love to say that my trip got me closer to understanding the Aboriginal culture but no... It did help me to fully appreciate air conditioning though.
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