26 Feb : Uluru / Ayer's Rock --> King's Canyon

Happy Birthday to Harv!

+Jill and I got up at the crack of early to board a bus/coach in the dark. They took us to the sunrise viewing dune of Uluru to see what happens out there as the sun comes up. We got an overcast day, so the sunrise behind was somewhat interesting for a bit, but the moment the sun came over the horizon, there were too many clouds for direct sunlight on the rock. It was still cool, but...

After this we spent about 2 hours around the rock including some walking right next to it. We failed to buy fly nets for our faces and the flies were simply unbearable. The problem with group tours is they stop and talk to everyone often and this is when the flies REALLY attack (they don't bite, but still)...

So despite Harv's wishes to "stay with the group", we kind of kept moving "in the area" on our own and looked at stuff without the people or the stopping just keeping an eye on their location.

Once the bus dropped us off, we cleaned up and checked out so we could take our next bus to Kings Canyon - all part of a 2 1/2 day tour. We did this because they have satellite phones which is the only way to communicate for several hundred km if there are any problems.

This was a long ride to an even more remote place. We were kind of trapped as there was no way of getting anywhere without the tour bus. That bus was adhering to THEIR schedule which was a bit too slow for us. We'd almost certainly still do a tour again, although perhaps we'd use a smaller company with a few less tourists. We generally could only go a fast (on any walks) as the slowest person in the group. I think we can walk faster on our hands.

We chose the 3 hour rim walk of Kings Canyon over the 1 hour canyon walk for tomorrow. We went to bed hoping for no rain because 3 hours in it did not sound like fun.

Thanks for tuning in.