I can't remember my name

Because that's what happens in the desert. I've finally escaped the rain and officially made it to The Outback! What a crazy place this is. The desert experience began in Alice Springs where Trevor bumped into one of his travel buddies. We went out to eat at a very classic outback saloon. We all had the combo plate which included Buffalo, Crocodile, Kangaroo, and Camel medallions. The kangaroo was by far the tastiest.

That night we camped by some cliffs, and in the morning the cops showed up. They didn't care if we camped there, but they were "concerned for our safety". they boasted about how Allice Springs has a pretty impressive crime scene compared to The States. "One of the local indiginous people could smash you over the head with a rock just to steal $5". Apparently it happened once before.

We climbed around on the cliffs a little that morning, spotted some kangaroos, then hit the dirt down to the most famous rock in Australia, Uluru.


When we got to the park that included Uluru, we learned that there is a canyon called King's Canyon nearby. so the first day was spent exploring this place. It was a very beautiful canyon, and took all day to explore. We wandered off the main trail and discovered a lovely reflecting pool hidden between the red cliff walls. Too cold to swim in, but nice to hang out by for a while.

That evening, we planned on getting gas and continuing on, but there was only one gas station every few hundred miles, and we were pretty low. We showed up at the gas station to an inoperative pump and a sign that declared the closing time of 7:pm. It was 6:55, so we went inside to meet a fat bearded man wearing a red flannel lumberjack shirt and stuffing cheese fries into his mouth. He refused to turn the pump on for us just as stubbornly as he refused to wipe the grease off his fingers. He suggested that we try another gas station that was back the way we came from, but wouldn't help us figure out if they were going to be open or not by the time we got there. as we left he added "Just so you know, when you're driving on these roads at night, you're taking your life into your own hands."
I don't really know what the paranoia is about, but don't you take your life into your own hands every time you drive? And would you really rather it be in somebody elses? These desert people are all a little edgy.
The other gas station was closed too, so we just pulled over and cooked dinner on one of Australia's free grills (This contry provides free gas and electric grills all over the country, at every rest stop and every campsite). We cooked up a gourmet rice dish with fresh coconut, cashews, and red peppers and the park rangers came by right as we were finishing. The wanted to make sure we weren't going to camp in the park because "it's dangerous" but they told us we can camp 3 miles down the road because that's not in the park. Apparently it's not so dangerous there. The nearby howl of wild dingos provided just the right dinner music.

Next day we picked up a hitch hiker and took him down the road to King's Canyon. He had just been at Uluru, and suggested that we first check out the Ulga's. So we did. The Ulgas are a collection of very giant, round rocks. there is a trial that meanders through them that takes a few hours. Again we left the main trail and explored a canyon in an attempt to reach the top of one of these rocks. The canyon was about 4 feet wide, and bordered by vertical walls that must have been nearly 500ft tall. Near the top, some bushes decided they would set up a barracade to stop any humans from going any further. We didn't make it to the top, but the rest of the trip was incredible enough that we weren't dissapointed.

The traditional thing to do is to photograph Uluru at sunrise or sunset. Since we played in the canyon so long, we missed the sunset so we decided to place ourselves at a good location to see the sunrise on the rock. We found a spot East of Uluru in the sand. The sand here is unlike any I've ever seen. It's SO red! It is so fine it flows like liquid when you run your hands through it, and even though it looks like it would be moist, it certainly isn't. And it makes a nice bed.

We got up before the sun and took about 50 pictures of the light changing color on Uluru. Then went to go get on top of it. The hike is pretty steep, and about 900 ft of vertical so a series of posts are installed with a chain running up the side of the rock. The rock is so rough though, that there's no chance of slipping so of course Trevor and I refused to use the chain.

In front of us were 300 college kids wearing flourescent green shirts. But directly in front of us was "Army Dad". Army dad had 4 daughters and was wearing some really fashionable camoflauge pants. He was holding on to the chain with both hands and jerking himself up the climb. every time one of his daughters decided she didn't need to use it he would bark out "Haing on to the Chine!" at the top of his lungs as if he was in the middle of a warzone. Finally he called them all to a halt and shouted out "If you don't haing on to the chine, I'll through you off this bloody rock miself!" Trevor and I strolled by with our hand in our pockets, exchanging smiles.

After spending the day exploring Uluru (What an awesome place) we continued our way South. Here's where we entered the real outback.
The landscape is completely flat.
There are no trees.
In fact, it's so flat that the wind sometimes blows and there's nothing to stop it. This makes all the rocks on the ground get pollished by the blowing sand. Every rock on the ground is shiny on one side. And the ground is covered with little pea-sized pebbles that have a baked-on black varnish. It's so flat that if you yell as loud as you can, your voice just gets ripped away from you. There is no echo whatsoever.

In the evening we decided to take a walk into this foreign landscape. I packed some fresh batteries, a light, and my GPS and set a waypoint at the location of the car. Then we set off into the darkness. After about 2.5 miles it was time to turn around. Now, we knew we had the GPS, but decided not to use it unless we needed to. When we ventured out, we tried to maintain a straight line (but knew that humans are actually incapable of this). So to return, we only needed to do a 180, and return.
That sounded too easy, so we closed our eyes and spun around a few dozen times in each direction. Then tried to figure out how to get back. I pointed one direction, and Trevor pointed 90 degrees from that. So we "Cheated" and looked up at the half moon. With the moon overhead, the bright side is West (if the moon is waxing). So this gave us a rough estimate. I was 90 degrees off, and Trevor was off by 180 degrees! Zoiks. Thankfully, we had marked an arrow in the sand before we spun, so after 20 minutes of searching, we found the arrow. It was pretty close to the direction we deduced from the moon.
When we returned, we expected to run into the highway about a half a mile from the car. But the craziest part is that we ended up reaching the car exactly! We were so impressed that we were dead on. At this time we took out the GPS and reviewed our path. Of course, it squiggled all over the desert.

So today we're in Adelade. On the way here we stopped at a lake to go swimming. But when we reached the shore, the sand turned to salt. The water was barely deeper than my toes and we walked out about a half a mile. The crystal clear water rippled over the white crusty bottom.

Thanks for reading, I'll now rest my fingers:Eric.