DAY 10 & 11 – Alice Springs

Good Morning Alice!

Saturday Low 7°c (45°F) – High 22°c (72°F)
15km

Sunday Low 5°c (41°F) – High 23°c (73°F)
149km

Saturday was definitely a down tools day.  Sometimes it is nice to just do nothing and pretty much nothing was what we did.  We had a few feathered visitors in the morning for breakfast and after some basic cleaning up of the van, and of ourselves, we headed into town to top up on groceries and a little bit of shopping.

The area is known locally as Mparntwe to its original inhabitants, the Arrernte, who have lived in the Central Australian desert in and around what is now Alice Springs for tens of thousands of years.  It wasn’t until alluvial gold was discovered to the east in 1887 at Arltunga 100 kms (62 miles) away that any significant European settlement occurred.  There are many amazing aboriginal cultural sites you can visit in the area.
 
Alice Springs, colloquially known as The Alice or just simply Alice, is the third-largest town in the Northern Territory with a population of about 26,500 in 2018.  Alice accounts for approximately 10% of the entire Northern Territory population and is situated roughly in Australia's geographic centre. It is nearly equidistant from Adelaide and Darwin being approximately 1500km (932 miles) from each city.  The town itself has a heavy cultural design throughout which we love, and hosts some unique events throughout the year including the Camel Cup, the Henley-on-Todd Regatta, Beanie Festival and the Tatts Finke Desert Race.

In 1872 the settlement was named “Stuart” with the completion of construction of a repeater station on the Australian Overland Telegraph Line that year which linked Adelaide to Darwin and Great Britain.  The telegraph line traced the route taken by John McDouall Stuart and opened up the interior for permanent settlement. The Alice Springs Telegraph Station was sited near what was thought to be a permanent waterhole in the normally dry Todd River.  The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills on 31 August 1933, after Lady Alice Todd, wife of the telegraph pioneer Sir Charles Todd who was then Superintendent of Telegraphs and Postmaster General of South Australia and the driving force for constructing the telegraph line.  
 
Surprisingly it was as recent as 4 February 2004 that Alice Springs was connected to Darwin by rail, when the first passenger train arrived in Darwin from Adelaide.
 
For us - Sunday in contrast was a busy day starting with an early rise, but no joy in capturing a sunrise.  Unfortunately the van park is surrounded by quite a steep hill to the north and north east so it obscures both the sunrise and sunsets and so far we haven’t taken a drive (or a walk) to find a location to take photos at that time.  There are lots of sunrises to go!

We had some more visitors for breakfast – this time the doves were joined by some far more forward guests (Australian Ringneck Parrots) who took getting their share of breakfast quite seriously.  Right down to landing on the bag of bread we had sitting on a table under the awning while making toast (outside because the infernal smoke detector likes to go off even when you are thinking about cooking something) and chewing a hole in the bag to get to the bread inside.  Two of them were happy to land on my arm and take pieces of toast from me while several others took turns on the arm of the awning chirping for their share.  Meanwhile the doves were busily picking up all the pieces of toast being dropped by these attention seekers, and later we were also joined by some little brown birds that I couldn’t locate an identity for.

It was another bath day for Kitty who had picked up a considerable amount of dust since her last bath and in our experience when she gets dusty she also develops a lot of static.  We’ve had so many shocks off her when trying to lift her out of the car at various stops during past trips to the centre, it isn’t pleasant for us or for her so trying to keep her clean is the best way to avoid it or at least reduce the incidents.

After a quick bite to eat for lunch we headed out to the east of Alice through the Emily & Jesse Gaps Nature Park, Corroboree Rock Conservation Reserve and Trephina Gorge Nature Park and spent the afternoon driving and walking through the area.  It’s amazing to think how centuries of erosion have carved away the rock to form these beautiful gorges and while there was little water anywhere to be seen, the wide bed that once held it is fascinating to walk through. 

Also located in this area is “The Ghost Gum”.  Not just ANY ghost gum, the largest one in the Country at over 33 metres (108 feet) tall, a circumference of 4.43 metres (just under 5 yards) and estimated to be around 300 years old as recognized by the National Register of Big Trees!  These trees have always fascinated me with their snow white trunk and branches that stand apart wherever they take root, especially here in the outback where the contrast between the white trees and their very red surroundings are really special.  The only real surprise for the afternoon was that apart from some local cattle, a few birds, bees, lizards and spiders, there was no larger wildlife to speak of.

It was well after 5.00pm by the time we returned to camp to start dinner and nice to chat with some of the travellers we’ve been running across here and there on our journey so far.