On our way to Coober Pedy on both sides of the road small conical hillocks peppered the landscape like giant anthills. They are spoils from miners’ digs and look an awful lot like the cones we saw at the Breakaways. Walking around at night out here is very dangerous because of the mining activity and…
After our big day and evening in Alice Springs the train headed south and next morning it was stopped in the middle of an empty landscape with flat horizon on all sides. We were at Manguri Station. Due to the lack of infrastructure, I assumed that ‘station’ wasn’t a place where trains stopped, it was…
After our wonderful visit to the Desert Park at Alice Springs our coach driver took us on a short tour of Alice Springs (commonly abbreviated to “The Alice”). Alice Springs lies almost exactly in the centre of Australia, midway between Darwin and Adelaide. Surrounded by desert ranges and ancient landscapes, it began as a telegraph…
The Ghan travelled south through flat, uninspiring semi-desert as we enjoyed dinner and on through the night. The next morning we stopped at Alice Springs. Pete and I had been there just last year and visited the attractions in and around the town – Simpson’s Gap, Standley Chasm, and a quick lunch stop at the…
“Regarded as one of the world’s greatest train journeys, The Ghan delivers so much more than an extended train ride. It promises access to parts of Australia no other holiday can come close to – the perfect balance of comfort and adventure, culminating in an experience that will move you in every sense of the…
Australia is a unique place. It’s the only place on Earth that is at the same time a country, a continent, and an island. And that last property has helped to make it a haven for monotremes, marsupials, and other weird critters. Europeans ‘discovered’ the Great South Land several times over the centuries, usually by…
Sunrise at Uluru at this time of year is around 6:30am. The Rock famously changes colour as the light grows in the eastern sky. It’s all part of the experience – but you have to get up well before sparrow fart to see the spectacle. We crawled out of bed at about 4:30 to be…
The first day of our actual tour was very busy. Our group of fifty was divided into the reds and the yellows and each group set off in a bus big enough for everyone to have a window seat. Our driver, Roger, a knowledgeable Kiwi who’d been around the Red Centre for many years, was…
I can’t help thinking that we’re living through 1939 all over again. Czar Putin has his troops massed on Ukraine’s border. All he needs is an excuse to invade. Back in 1939, Hitler had security service (SD – Sicherheitsdienst in German) agents dressed in Polish uniforms attack a radio station in Poland and broadcast anti-German…
After several harrowing months of American politics and covid-19 I thought I’d take a look back at some of the beautiful country that is Australia. It’s a big place with diverse habitat. Pete and I have flown across it often and driven around it twice. We’re looking forward to being able to get out more…