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Ok, so, part two. I'll try to keep it brief this time, probably won't work though.
So, yea, Alice Springs. It's a pretty horrible place. It has about 30,000 people, the majority of which are Aborigninal. Which I would have no problem with, except the fact that they don't believe in personal hygiene, never have done. If I had to make an honest guess judging by the smell, I would say they shower once every 2 weeks, if that. They also walk down the street giving people evil looks, and making stupid shrieking noises. It's really sad how they've been treated though, we watched Rabbit Proof Fence on the coach and it highlights how badly they were treated when the Europeans came over. They've never been allowed to integrate into society, which is really sad. But they do harrass you a lot. Alice Springs is the Murder Capital of Australia, so I didn't walk anywhere late at night by myself.
We only had one night at Alice and we had to be up at 4.30am!!!! Anything with 5 in it is bad enough, but 4 is just unacceptable. Anyway, we began our trip to Ayres Rock. It was only a one night trip so it was a bit rushed. It took 5 hours to get from Alice to Kings Canyon, which was our first stop. It's like a smaller version of The Grand Canyon. I am so glad that I was speaking to a lady on our bus who told me I needed a fly net, you may laugh at the pictures but I didn't care - those flies are the most annoyingest things i have come accross on this trip. They managed to get in my netting aswell, so they kept landing on my eye! The cliffs in the Canyon were massive, even I got scared standing near them!
Haha, funny story. Whilst walking around the Canyon our driver guide told us to make this noise, so we did, then he told us that it's that noise that attracts this certain type of Koala only found in Kings Canyon. So he then took us over to this tree and pointed it out. It was one of those small clip on ones that you can buy from the shops, so we all started laughing, and then Becky got her camera out and took a photo, wondering why we were all laughing. She was amazed by this Koala! Eventually he pointed another one out which had an australian jacket on, then she got it! The whole group found it rather hilarious.
After Kings Canyon we headed to camp, which was by Ayres Rock. We didn't quite make it in time for sunset so we just stopped on a sand dune and took a photo. Now, I understand the importance of good batteries, if you don't spend much on them then they run out so it actually works out cheaper to buy more expensive ones. Becky however did not grasp this, so she spent about $2 on 4 batteries for her camera, put them in and found they weren't even strong enough to work! So she tried mine and they were fine. I put hers in mine to see if they'd work and because mine uses 4 they were just strong enough to. So Becky suggests 'Hey, why don't we swap! And I'll buy some more at the next place and give you yours back!'. Since this was only the 1st day in the desert I knew she wasn't going to get me any soon. But being nice I agreed cos I didn't want her to miss out on any photos. However, the batteries ran out in my camera just after I took my 1st photo of Ayres Rock! I was so annoyed because that meant I couldn't take any with my camera of Ayres Rock, Kings Canyon or The Olgas!!!! I think she was just jealous of my photos cos she know how good they'd be. So I snapped away with hers, that's why the only ones of Ayres Rock are on Beckys Photos.
That night was really good. I slept in a Swag for the first time. Its like an outdoor mattress with a little covering, hold on, im sure iv already explained this somewhere. Oh well. It's so weird, you wake up in the middle of the night and open your eyes, and you're gazing at thousands of stars! Apparently it's really likely that you'll see shooting stars. Sadly I didn't, fell asleep too quickly. The next day we went to Ayres Rock, it was cloudy though so we didn't get any amazing colour changes of it at sunrise, and walking around we didnt see any sun on it. It was still pretty amazing to see though. You can climb up it, but the aboriginal people don't like it, it's so sacred and if anyone dies on it then they have to morn you and your family for a month, like crying and wailing and everything. And 36 people have died over the years, the last one was last year when a man saw his bus leave so he started running down, tripped and fell over the edge, and kept on falling. You can't climb if there's a chance of it raining or if it's going to be over 36C. I couldn't believe how steep it was, and there was no railings, only a chain in the middle! Not sure if I'd have done it.
After Uluru it was on the The Olgas, these are 36 rock things which are really high and look like Homer Simpson from a distance. After that we went back to Alice.
The next morning it was up really early again. We started our journey from Alice to Darwin - 3 days but 600km less than Cairns to Alice, and it was along Stuart Highway (only one track for each direction though). The first night we stayed at... somewhere, I really can't remember where. I want to say Tennant Creek. Yea, think that's right. It was on a little camp site, and after I killed about 20 spiders in our tent, and could still see at least 20 more I decided to sleep outside again, so Becky was too scared inside so she joined me. This time the sky was much clearer. There really is nothing like sleeping outside. And because we were heading north it wasn't cold at all at night. Oh yea, almost forgot, the first day we visited the Devils Marbles, they're so amazing because they're so natural! They're also pretty hard to climb up! It's like proper rock climbing, I managed to scrape my hand. The aboriginals don't like you climbing them, and when I got to the top of a really high one the wind starting blowing loads, I took that as a sign to get down!
The second night we slept outside again. This time it was a little scarier because we were in the middle of nowhere. But still fun, I kept thinking of HIll billys who live by themselves in the outback.
We passed through some towns on our journey, one of them had 3000people, and it was the 3rd largest in the Northern Territory, which I couldn't believe.
The last day I wentswimming in this really nice rock pool area, it was really deep water though with turtles and fish, and apparently snakes - didn't realise that though. Before that we went for a tough walk, and it got sooo hot so we ran back.
We're here in Darwin now and I really like it. We arrived the day the Arafura Games began and we're leaving the day after they finish. It's really cool, I like playing spot the athlete. I was sitting on the internet and about 10 walked past at once! There was also a 7foot giant infront of me in Subway whose arms were about as big as my legs. I haven't been to watch them yet but I'm hopefully going tommorrow. It's free and they have squash, badminton, boxing, everything, even this weird jackie chan style volley ball game with ur feet. Off to the cinema now.
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