Mulgas Uluru Trip

Alive Springs is not a very exciting town. It's basically a resort town with a few stores and a lot of aboriginals. Kerry was debating whether or not to take a shower before out big camping trip but I elected to watch the movie they were projecting be the pool: Moulin rouge. I forgot how stupid it was. Got in bed because we were leaving at 6am. We had been up since 4:30 and we were exhausted. The roommates in the hostel were watching MASH then ghost whisperer, then Greys anatomy. Nothing I wanted to watch.
It was freezing in our room. Heat is not something that the Aussies believe in. It's like Europe. They heat it enough during the winter for you to sleep in in your winter clothes!! I was freezing!!
Day 1 began at 6am and of course we played those icebreaker games to meet evrryone in the group. We were a very diverse group: Kerry and I, two Brits, seven Dutch, couple of Germans, an Italian, a Brazilian, an Aussie, two Irish, four Chinese, and a Taiwanese! Then we divided into groups of four and we were teamed with Linda and Ingrid, two sisters from the Netherlands. Played lots of games... ugh. Most of our group was really nice. We first went to kings canyon and it was a 7 or 8 k hike. The first leg of the hike was called heartbreak hill. It was about 300 stairs! Made it to the top but had to drink a lot of water!! The hike around the canyon was beautiful and pretty hot. Took a lot of pics there.
Then we headed to dinner at Mt. Connor which is called fuluru because it looks like Uluru but is one meter shorter! If you didn't know any better you'd think it was Uluru! After that we stayed to see sunset and see the pretty red color that t the rock takes. The outback is much different than you'd think. I'd expected it to like our desert; very red and with little vegetation. It's nothing like that!! It's quite green! There are trees and everything! Apparently the whole area used to be an inland sea before it dried up, so far under the ground there is a reserve of water for plants to tap into and people can dig wells!
Sunset was pretty and we went to our first camping site. No toilets or tents. We camped under the stars. We camped in swags which are like waterproof covers for your sleeping bag. Let me just say that going to the bathroom outside in the dark isn't so bad! When the sun was down it was quite chilly and our group was in charge of starting the fire. Kerry volunteered us since she had a lighter! Ingrid, Linda, and I thought she was crazy, but we did our job rather well!! We had the fire going in no time and Halley, our tour guide, had dinner started!! She kept saying we were having camel and no one really believed her, but that night, I had camel!! It didn't taste like much because it was the meat in spaghetti bolognaise! She said that they have a large population of wild camel, so people slaughter them for food! It wasn't that bad, but Kerry wouldn't try it. I never would have thought I'd be adventurous with food, but I figured it was meat, so how bad could it be?
After dinner we went to bed because we were rising early to see the sunrise at Uluru!
Day 2 was the best day of the trip!! The next morning we were up by 430 and on the road to Uluru. The sunrise was nice and Uluru was beautiful!! I'm glad it's not just a big rock in the middle of the desert!! After sunrise we went to see the ulgas at kata tjura national park. They are a bunch of dome shaped rocks formed from some sir of earth movement. We had a choice of what hike to do. We could do 2 km, 5km, or 7km. Kerry and I were debating which to do because we wanted to climb Uluru later that day! We elected to do the 7km because since we were there we might as well do it. Many of the walks we did, you couldn't really look around because you had to keep watching where you stepped so you wouldn't fall off a rock and break an ankle or something! The hike was worth it and whn we returned we felt good.
Then came the best part of the whole trip. Uluru is 860 meters (about a mile) above ground and there were 12 of us from the group who were going to climb it! The first part is almost completely vertical. I was carrying my water, but I couldn't grab the chain there for aid, so I asked Kerry to put my huge water bottle in her bag. She kindly did, but I knew it weighed her down. It took some effort to get up the chain, but we stopped a couple of times to rest! I volunteered to carry the bag because I felt bad I had given Kerry my water, so we switched off. When we got to the top of the chain, we were only about a third of the way to the top. This was the bit when I didn't think I could go all the way and had a mini meltdown, and the group went ahead of me. I sat for a bit, then decided I would regret it if I didn't do it, so I started climbing. I was surpassed by a father and his 12 or 13 year old son. I thought, "if this kid can do it, I sure as he'll can do it!" Nothing like the competitive nature. By this point, the rest of the group was way ahead of me so I plunged ahead alone. The wind on the top was unreal. Once I'd gotten over the fact that the wind would not blow me away, I forged ahead. It was more like rolling hills that were rock of course, so it was a lot of up and down on the top til you reached the highest point! I could see the rest of the group and I took lots of pics for various people on the way, but finally I made it!!! And I even have a photo to prove it! My team; Kerry, Ingrid, and Linda cheered me on!! The view was outstanding and I'm really glad I did it! Going down was so much easier than going up except the really steep part at the end. We had to go very slow and at some points go backward while hanging onto the chain!! My muscles were burning, but it was an incredible feeling to finish!!!
Good time when we finally got something to eat that night. I really wanted a steak and potatoes, but none of that here: we had a chicken curry thing with rice. We ate while waiting for the sunset on Uluru. I inhaled my food. I think we all did! The sunset was anticlimatic because it got cloudy, but it didn't matter! There a ton of people there for the sunset; some had flown in specifically or the sunset. Some spent a lot of money! I would have been disappointed! Then we headed to the campsite where we engaged in all sorts of silly games that would have gotten me totally drunk if I had been drinking.
During the night, in the middle of the desert, it started to rain!! Halley said this is the first time in 6 years it's ever rained on her tours. I just pulled my swag over me head, pulled my shoes into my sleeping bag and went back to sleep! No one wanted to wake up for sunrise because it was cloudy, so we slept it. Then we returned to Uluru for a heritage walk, and after that we began the journey back to the exciting Alice Springs! We stopped on the way to ride a camel, see some kangaroos, an emu, and a dingo! I didn't know a dingo was a dog! I have many more stories to share when I see you, but this was a great tour!! I'd recommend it to anyone!!