Red Centre

We had driven for several hours in the dark last night, so the landscape looked very different when we woke up this morning. It had changed from open, lush, green grasslands to a rugged, red-orange and sandy desert. An added bonus of waking up this morning was that I got an extra 30 minutes of sleep because of the time change when we crossed the border yesterday. We explored the Devils Marbles and watched the colors on the rocks change as the sun came up. We even spotted a Rock Wallaby and Joey very high up. The Devils Marbles are so unique because they have been weathered down to the point of being smooth, giant, rounded boulders that seem like someone has delicately placed them on top of one another. We took some funny pictures and then hit the road.

WE MADE IT TO THE RED CENTRE – Alice Springs! We’ve been on the road for about 23+ hours but we did it. There is a large aboriginal population that lives in Alice Springs and surrounding areas, and it feels like there is a lot to learn about their culture.

We decided to head to the West MacDonnell Ranges for the afternoon and stopped at a place called Simpson’s Gap. The scenery here is familiar and really reminded us of our NT/Western Australia trip we took in September. The pictures we took here do not capture how high the walls of the Gorges really are. We drove further west to a campground called Ellery Creek Bighole. It was nice to be back at an actual campground with very basic facilities and not a caravan park. We made dinner and watched the sunset over the ranges. Willy made a rather large campfire and we sat under the stars and planned the next part of our outback adventure.

Road Sign of the Day: “We like our lizards frilled not grilled”.