I got up before the sunrise and started making my way to the South Australia – Northern Territory border. I was a bit concerned because it still had been less than 14 days since I was in Brisbane. And since Brissie was a hot spot for a week or so, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to cross the border. But NT revoked the hot spit designation for Brisbane because there was only ever one case found there. So I was good to go.
After I crossed the border I drove another two hours and I reached this small rest station. There’s an hour difference between NT and SA even though they should share the same time zone. So I had to wait for the gas station to open. But to my surprise there was a monument, albeit small, marking the spot as the center of Australia. So there you have it. I made it to the center without even meaning to.
I’ve been to the most northern and the most eastern points already. Now the center. So I will need to return and do the most southern and western points as well.
I ended up getting to Yulara which is the small tourist town outside the national park in the morning and I booked into a campsite. The only campsite in town. And it’s $40 a night. I guess when you’re the only camp in town you can charge what you want. But I am not really that surprised. I am in the middle of nowhere after all.
It’s not a bad camp site to be fair. Has everything I need. A shower, a kitchen, a toilet. Which is more than I’ve had camping on the side of the road the last few days.
I was pretty exhausted so I set up my hammock and just chilled for most of the day. Yeah, I forgot to mention. I bought a travel hammock. Great investment so far.
I met a few people at the campsite and I spent the night just hanging out with them. Two Aussies and a guy from Ivory Coast. He spent a good amount of time in the US playing college basketball but ended up breaking his ankle during pre-season and his life changed forever. He ended up out here and he seems extremely happy.
I got up early in the morning the next day and made my way towards The Valley of the Winds. It’s not Uluru, that’s something totally different. This is a separate rock formation 40 minutes drive west of Uluru. The hike is very famous and to be honest, it was breathtaking.
The problem is that I made a wrong turn to start off with. I went into another valley. To be fair, there was a trail to follow but it was not marked at all. I was getting a bit frustrated because I kept losing the trail. The trail that didn’t exist. I made it all the way through the valley though.
I realized it wasn’t the right track because it was supposed to be a loop track. And when I got through the wooded area I couldn’t locate the trail. So I made my way back through.
To be fair, I was feeling a bit uneasy while hiking through that smaller valley. It just felt very dark and uninviting to me. I felt bad energy there and I was excited to get back towards the main trail. I am not one to feel like that normally. It was a bit strange.
When I got back to the start I felt kind of stupid because it was very clearly marked. Like overwhelmingly so. I already walked 4 KM in that other valley so what was another 8? It was worth it.
Imagine you’re the size of a termite. And you’re walking around between a bunch of the termite mounds you helped build. That’s what it felt like to be walking around this valley. It’s the best way I can describe it. That’s what these large rocks looked like. Really big termite mounds.
They were stunning though. The whole walk was. But because I wasted an hour or two in that other valley, I got stuck walking in the valley at around 11 o’clock. And that’s a no-no because it just starts getting too hot. The trail is closed starting at 11 o’clock because it is very dangerous to be walking there at that time with the heat and the sun.
I did alright though. Drank plenty of water. They had a few water stations on the trail which was very good. Taking breaks along the way when I needed to.
After reseting and eating a bit I went around to Wilpa Gorge which is a small trail on the other side of the rock formation. It wasn’t long but it was worth it. I was all alone so I howled a few times to see if I could make an echoe. And boy did I. I think it was the first real echoe experience of my life.
I think that has been the best part about this trip for me. No one is here because it is the summer and it is considered too hot to go into this part of the country. And honestly it is very hot but not unbearable. You just need to do things in the morning and the evening and chill during the hottest part of the days.
I mean I’m not completely alone. It’s just that there are fewer people around. I met this couple at lunch and they were super nice. The guy was actually a Jehovah’s Witness and we got to talking about that. It was really interesting to learn about what his beliefs are because everyone always gives JWs a bad rap. But it was cool to talk with him. He was a really smart and open minded guy seemed to me.
The next day I got a pretty early start again because I wanted to see the sunrise at Uluru. The rock is only about 20 minutes drive away from town and I got there were plenty of time to spare. I met a group of Austrians and Germans traveling together. It was nice to chat with them while we waited for the sun to rise.
We got a couple of really great pictures with the rock as the sun was rising. It’s nice to have a few people around because I was able to get a few pictures with me in them. Usually, I only take pictures of sceneries because I really do not like to take selfies.
After sunrise, I went over towards the rock. My intention was to do the 11 KM circuit walk around Uluru. The first part of the walk takes you to the Mala waterhole. The park has a lot of really great signage that explains how each place was used by the Aboriginal people. There are a lot of natural caves built into the side of the rock.
It seems that each cave was used by a group of people within the tribe. One cave was used for young boys and another for men. One was used by women and girls. And there was even a cave for older people. There was a really good amount of Aboriginal rock art and it was really cool to see because you could tell that this place was used for a very long time by the Aboriginal people.
It makes sense because the land around Uluru is very desolate. The rock houses few water holes and the vegetation is quite green and dense in certain areas. Obviously, this would attract animals and that makes for good for hunting.
One of the signs explains how the Aboriginals hunted emus. They would wait by the water hole and when they saw the emus coming they would make sure to stay hidden and wait for them to finish drinking. The last emu to leave would be the one that was killed. They did this because they didn’t want the other emus to be scared of that water hole. If they killed an emu in sight of the other emus then they would stay away from the water hole. It would be very difficult to eat emu from that point forward.
It’s very smart and I happen to think that Europeans wouldn’t have thought of this. They probably just would have killed the entire group and had a bunch of emu meat one time.
The walk took about 3 hours. It was really cool to see the rock from different vantage points. There are so many geological features. Each part of the rock is unique and awesome to understand the stories that are associated with each.
I will admit that by the time I was done I was pretty happy to be finished because it was getting extremely hot. The sun just destroys you out there. By the parking lot they have the original trail that people used to use to climb up the mountain but it’s no longer in use. They banned climbing Uluru last year.
I was talking with one of the guys in the lot. He was an older Australian man and he climbed Uluru a couple of times. We were just talking about how it was up there and it sounded pretty cool. But it’s very sacred to the Aboriginal people so I think it was a good decision to ban people from climbing.
From there I started my trip back to Coober Pedy. It was a long drive so I spent most of the day on the road. I got to Coober Pedy at around sunset and I camped in the same spot as the last time. The plan was to go back into the town and do a little sightseeing in the morning. But I didn’t stay very long. Almost everything worth seeing was closed until the late morning.
I got back on the road around 9 AM and drove for most of the day. Got down to the Yorke Peninsula just before sunset. So basically 8 hours of driving yesterday and 8 hours of driving today. I’m pretty damn tired.