Fall here is in April, and it was once again time for another school break for the girls. We wish the girls' school in Maryland had the same set up. They do 10 weeks of school each term/quarter here, and then get a two or three week break. Anyway.....
This year for fall break we decided we would finally make it to the outback, specifically Uluru (formerly named Ayers Rock). We would have done this sooner, but the airline tickets to get to the center of Australia are stupid expensive. It was hard to spend the money when it would be cheaper for us to go back to Fiji, but we all felt we needed to see this part of Australia in order to say we've seen Austrlia.
After this trip there is only one part of Australia we won't have seen, which is South Australia. Shannon regrets she and the girls won't see it. Shannon also regrets we won't make it to Darwin or Cairns, but there is only so much time and only so much money.
Sydney
Our airline tickets to the outback were from Sydney to Alice Springs. We could have also flown into Uluru itself, but the tickets to Alice were much cheaper, and we have friends who live there, so we went ahead and booked those. Since we were going to have to travel to Sydney anyway, we decided to take a couple days and spend them in Sydney. We've been before but those trips have always been really quick trips. This time we had four days in Sydney which was quite nice. Also different this time was that we did not stay right in downtown Sydney, but rather booked an AirBnb in North Sydney, just across the Sydney Harbor Bridge.
Everything about this trip to Sydney was better than all our preivous trips. The weather was perfect. The AirBnb was super nice (even if the elevator in the building kept breaking). The neighborhood we stayed in was quite lovely. Shannon is really glad we took a little time and stayed somewhere new.
Our AirBnb was on the 8th floor of an apartment building in the
Kirribilli neighborhood of North Sydney. It had the most incredible views of the Sydney Harbor Bridge from the living room window:
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| You can even see the opera house on the left hand side |
It was a short walk to the water. On Sunday morning, Lauren and Shannon got up early to explore:
We were only ten minutes from
Luna Park, a heritage listed amusement park and one of Sydney's most famous landmarks. It is one of only two amuesment parks in the world protected by government legislation. It was originally contructed in 1935, but has been redevoloped multiple times since then. More on Luna Park later.
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| Luna park well before it opened.... |
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| view of Sydney from Luna Park |
Shannon and Lauren picked up breakfast at a bakery for everyone and walked back to the apartment. Once everyone was fed and ready (and the adults caffeinated), we all went to check out the
Kirribilli Markets, which take place in the Burton Street tunnel right near Milson's Point. The markets had 220 stalls. We didn't stay at the markets too long, but Shannon did get a new
handmade coffee mug.
Next we walked across the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Mike took tons of pictures, as he does, like this beauty:
We walked the whole thing, but not before stopping at the
Pylon Lookout and Museum. We did this as a cheaper alternative to the
Bridge Climb, which we all really wanted to do in theory, but was prohibitively expensive for four people. And we really weren't sure if the kids would pull through. The Pylon lookout was 1/10 the cost of us doing the bridge climb. You ascend over 200 steps to the lookout to get 360 degree views of Sydney. So while it was no bridge climb, it was still pretty cool!
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| Lauren and her fancy sunglasses waiting for the lookout to open |
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| Entrance to the lookout |
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| view from the lookout |
We then finished walking to the other side of the bridge, and grabbed an Uber to go a theather where we saw &Juliet, a 2019 coming-of-age musical based on the idea of what would happen if Juliet and Romeo did not die at the end of the play. It was cute and everyone enjoyed themselves, but Lauren probably enjoyed it most of all.
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After the play, we walked around a different weekend market before it closed, which happend not long after we got there. The
Rocks Markets take place on the weekend. It was a nice place to stroll around. We even ran into the Sydney-based artists,
Outer Island, that painted the picture of rosellas for Shannon below:
Stephanie and Amy (of Outer Island) are so nice, it was fun bumping into them. They suggested we check out the gelato truck at the markets, and we are so glad we did. Man was that good gelato, in particular the soft serve chocolate they had was a big hit with all three of the Sanders women!
After the market, we walked across the bridge (again) to Kirribilli and brought home dinner from a neighborhood restaurant. It was a fun filled day, but nothing compared to the following day.
On Monday, we all went to Luna Park. Mike and the girls rode the rides for almost the entire time the park was open. We arrived at 10 am and left at 5pm, just one hour short of closing. They had SEVEN hours of fun. Mike was exhausted.
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Caitlyn must have ridden this swing ride close to 10 or 15 times. Mike went twice, one more time than he wanted to, but he went again to support Lauren, who also only went once
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| The view from the ferris wheel |
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| The disturbing park trash bins |
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Another pretty picture of the bridge at sunset as we walked back after the long day at Luna Park
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After the seven hours at the park, the girls just wanted to go back to the airbnb. They ate leftovers from the night before, and Mike and Shannon went out for a delicious Korean/Japanese dinner about a two-minute walk from where we stayed. We liked it so much we brought the girls back the next night.
Our third day in Sydney we took a ferry across the harbor just for fun. Then we went out to Bondi Beach to check out it. It was a nice beach, but would have been too cold for the girls to swim, so we just walked around. Shannon really wanted to do the
Bondi to Coogee Walk. We only made it 1.2km between the Bondi Icebergs and Tamarama before the girls ran out of steam. They were probably still tired from the day before. Shannon would love to return to the area and stay somewhere along the walk and walk more of it. It was SO pretty.
The Outback
Wednesday we had a morning flight from Sydney to Alice Springs. In pure Qantas style, the plane was a little bit late, but we made it to Alice Springs just a little past noon. We had to hop right in our rental car and start the drive down to Uluru right away, as the drive was expected to take about 4 or 5 hours, and we wanted to make it there before dark. Mike was very excited about his rental - a Toyota Prado!
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| First rest stop |
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| Sign with road conditions |
Third and scariest rest stop at Curtin Springs Station (near Mount Conner)
It took us more than five hours to get there because, well...kids. We stayed at the Desert Gardens Hotel at the Ayers Rock Resort. There are really only so many choices in Uluru, and they are all at the Ayers Rock Resort. The room was nice enough though. We had to drop our stuff in the room and quickly eat dinner, because we had booked an Astro Tour at Uluru.
We hopped on a tour bus and rode over to Uluru, where they had set up some stools and talked to us about the night sky. The sky was beautifully clear, and we learned how to find the Southern Cross, which you can't see from back home in the U.S. Then they had set up a couple of telescopes to show us some things and helped us take a picture of the moon through the telescope. Then finally, they took professional photos of us.
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| Shannon's favorite picture using her phone |
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| professional photo of the girls |
professional family photo
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| Mike working to get a good shot with his Sony camera |
Mike's jpg result. He learned to scope out his location and composition before it's so dark that you're unable to see the tree in the shot
We didn't get back to the hotel until late. Despite that, Shannon made everyone get up early the next day to see Uluru at sunrise. Various levels of happiness were on display that morning.
Note Uluru's vertical stripes. These are layers of sendiment that formed hundreds of millions of years ago before it titled the 90 degrees that you see today. For more information, research Alice Springs Orogeny
Next we went closer to Uluru itself to do a free, ranger-lead walk around the base. The walk starts at 8am at the Mala car park. We are glad we took the walk. For one thing, it was free, but it was also really well done. Our ranger, coincidently named Lauren, was so knowledgeable. Mike and Shannon were impressed when she confidently told someone not to take pictures of the culturally sensitive side of Uluru.
After we did the base walk, we returned to the hotel for lunch. Mike and Caitlyn ran back to the base of Uluru for a Segway tour. Lauren was not tall, heavy, or old enough to do the Segway tour, so Shannon and Lauren rested at the hotel.
That night we did a general admission of the "Field of Lights" tour. This tour was the cheapest tour offered by the resort, and it was totally NOT worth it to us. They drop you off near a stinky composting drop toilet and leave you at the field for an hour. They also inform you that alcohol is not allowed during this one-hour tour. Why? Because that's a different tour that they offer, and it's far more expensive. You really only need 15-30 minutes to walk through it. Once you're done, you're left to sit near the stinky toilet and wait for the bus to come back.
The next day, Shannon made the family get up early (AGAIN) and head over to Kata Tjuta to take an early morning hike. It's about 40 minutes or so away from the hotel. We hiked Walpa Gorge walk. Walpa means windy, and, oh boy, was it windy! This was a really nice hike. Shannon and Mike were really glad we did it.
start of the walk into Walpa Gorge
taking a quick photo break
celebrating the end of the hike
We did not have long to hang out at Kata Tjuta, because we had a dot painting workshop starting at 11am back near the hotel, so we hopped back into the Toyota.
The workshop began with a demonstration. There we learned about the symbols used in dot painting. Everyone had fun trying their hand at the art. Shannon was surprised at how time intensive it was and has a new found respect for all the beautiful dot painting we have seen here in Australia.
The day ended with a sunset viewing of Uluru. We got to the viewing area early so there was some waiting to do. The girls spent the time waiting in the back of the truck and playing "MASH."
one of the rare photos of both girls
Mike fussing with his camera
Mike's sunset shot of Uluru
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| sunset view of Kata Tjuta from a distance |
The next day we ate a quick breakfast and jumped into the car to head off to Kings Canyon. It was a quiet drive of about 3 hours. We drove by Curtin Springs Station again, but this time turned north on another road heading further into the outback. After a good deal of time, we stopped at Kings Creek Station for a quick lunch.
After lunch, it wasn't much further until we made it to the Discovery Resort in Kings Canyon. It was a nice place and had pretty decent food. Shannon and Mike really wish we had a second day in Kings Canyon. We only had enough time to do the short King Creek Walk and couldn't do the Rim Walk, which is supposed to be spectacular.
The other thing we haven't mentioned about our time in the outback is the shear number of flies that were around. We don't know if they are bad all year, but there were a lot while we were there. Thankfully, Shannon had pre-purchased fly nets you can put over your head so the flies can't fly up your nose, in your mouth, or your ears, or near your eyes. The flies were the WORST while we were at Kings Canyon. We have never seen SO many flies, let alone had so many on us. Even despite the flies, it was a really nice walk.
our starting point for the King Creek Walk
Lauren and Mike took a short detour up the start of the Kings Canyon Rim Walk to check out the view. There were so many steps, but the view was nice. This wasn't from the top but pretty close. Mike has to stop several times along the hike to the top. Lauren...not so much. Youth was on her side
There were so many flies!
The next morning, we had to start the final drive to get us back to Alice Springs. We opted to take the Mereenie Loop, which is an unsealed road between Kings Canyon and Alice Springs. For the unsealed part of the road, you have to be in a 4x4. However, the road was actually pretty nice for our drive, but we hear that is definitely not always the case. We also had to get a permit to travel on the road, as it crossses Aboriginal land. It was quite the adventure. We saw a dingo right as we started on our journey. We passed a school group who lost a tire on their trailer. We stopped, but they didn't need any help. We saw brumbies (wild horses) along the way. And, towards the very, very end of the unsealed road, Mike spotted some wild camels in the distance.
The unsealed section was well over 100km. We were told it would take 1.5-2 hours, but it took us almost 3, as you really have to drive to the road conditions, which weren't always the smoothest.
Mike was really excited about this drive. It was a neat thing to have done.
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| warning us there may be wild camels |
quick photo stop
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| we swear there are camels in this picture |
We made it to Alice Springs about 2pm. We checked into our hotel and then called our friends who live in Alice Springs. We met up with them and went to the
Alice Springs Telegraph Station,where we took another nice walk, and the kids all got a chance to catch up. It was a very short period of time in Alice, but we are glad we got to see our friends.
We are so thankful we had a chance to see the outback. If Shannon had it to do over again, she would have spent more time out there, particularly in Kings Canyon. There were more hikes Shannon and Mike wanted to do, but we were all pretty worn out by the end of the trip. In the end, perhaps the amount of time we spent was actually just right. We suggest you go, just remember to pack fly nets and water!!
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