DAY 9 – Kulgera Roadhouse – Alice Springs

Good Morning Kulgera!
 
Low 7°c (45°F) – High 23°c (73°F)
275km
 
Keeping to the habit of waking early to catch the sunrise however this morning saw no colour in the first light at all, just thick fog that lasted until well after 8.30am.  A quick shower, breakfast and packup and we were on the road but not before creating another memorable moment – purchase of the most expensive fuel so far at $2.61/Litre.
 
The fog lifted to reveal a gorgeous sunny day with very little cloud at all.  Once again we skip quite a few of the real features of Central Australia in this section of the trip.  On previous trips we have turned left at Erldunda and taken in Uluru.  It’s an amazing area and one we always have enjoyed and felt an enormous spiritual connection with, but the expense and time it would take out of this trip was too much and we felt the time (and money) would be better spent in Western Australia giving us more time to explore there.
 
Erldunda itself is pretty much a roadhouse that also offers some accommodation and camping.  We’ve never stayed here on previous trips, preferring a freecamp just up the road when heading to Uluru on the Lassiter Highway.  We did have a memorable experience on our first trip when we stopped for fuel.  There was a huge amount of traffic waiting and it took no less than 40 minutes for our turn at the pump.  I suspect travellers this year might experience something worse than this as we noticed driving past that there was some considerable work going on around the pump area and obviously they were replacing at least one fuel tank.
 
It is through this area also that the landscape changes significantly from very flat terrain to very rocky outcrops and winding roads.  A change from the long stretches of flat straight roads we’ve had so far.
 
A quick stopover for morning tea at the “Cannonball Memorial” for a coffee and some sponge cake, (which of course Miss Kitty had to partake some of the cream).  The Northern Territory Cannonball Run was held in 1994 from 22-27 May on the Stuart Highway from Darwin to Alice Springs and return, a total distance of approx 3200 kilometres.  In part organised by Australian Motorsport legend Allan Moffat, it attracted 118 racing enthusiasts from all over the world and contained three driving phases within the event

• The "flying miles".  These were a test of a car's acceleration with cars crossing a starting line at 60 kilometres per hour and 1600 metres later their speed was recorded by radar, with points awarded accordingly.
• The timed sectors.  These were approximately 100 kilometre stretches to which set times was applied.
• Normal, everyday driving during which there was no competitive element which accounted for the greatest part of the trip.

During one of the timed sections on 24 May, a Ferrari F40 crashed into a checkpost near Alice Springs, killing its occupants, the Japanese duo Akihiro Kabe (a millionaire Japanese dentist who had a collection of 9 classic cars including a Ferrari Deytona) and co-driver Takeshi Okano, and two track officials, Tim Linklater and Keith Pritchard. An inquest found that the direct cause of the accident was driver error entering the checkpoint at an excessive speed.  Just the day before, a similar accident had narrowly missed officials.
 
A memorial was erected at the location of the accident.
 
There have definitely been improvements made to a lot of the road since our last trip.  Previously there was no road verge much of the trip and some of the drop offs from road to gravel were extremely deep and rough.  The new roadworks include a road verge wide enough for a vehicle which will definitely make it much safer not only to drive but also to pull over especially in an emergency.  The majority of the speed limit so far has been 110km/hr with a few 130km/hr sections.  North of Alice there is now some 300kms of unrestricted sections allowing for any speed driving to the conditions.  I’m sure there are a number of people who enjoy taking advantage of the opportunity to test out their car on these parts without fear of a speeding fine.

We often see cyclists on our trips, with today's spotting being a bit more light on with gear than most. Forgive me to those of you who love cycling, but this just seems like a "wayyyyy too hard" method of seeing the country, regardless of how cheap it might be.

We arrived in Alice Springs around 2.30 checking in to the Discovery Park Caravan Park – we think we have a great site, good shade in the afternoon but enough sun to enjoy and get washing dry which ended up being my first job on site.  Doesn’t matter where you go you still have a few home chores to do.  We were made well aware on arrival and by subsequent text message reminders, to lock away any valuables at night or if we leave camp and to ensure that windows are closed and locked.  The crime rate in Alice has escalated over recent years and probably isn’t the sort of place you want to wander down the street at night.  The park is a little out of town, opposite the showgrounds where we have stayed a number of times before.  We’ll likely have a quiet day tomorrow to relax from all the travel days and then do some exploring.
 
The weather forecast for our time here is perfect and clearly we are well into holiday mode as we are both having to look at our watch to know what day it is.  Oh to be retired – but no lotto win for us this week sadly!