Kings Canyon

If you're making the 500km drive from Alice Springs to Uluru, then you may as well take a 300km return detour out to the breath taking Kings Canyon. Like Uluru, there's not a whole lot on the way to see, but keep your eyes peeled for wild camels - they're everywhere and interestingly Kings Canyon Station, a roadhouse/caravan park 30km from Kings Canyon is the biggest exporter of camels and camel meat in Australia! Check out this guy that we saw sitting in the bush on the side of the road!

Kings Canyon Resort is the only other place to stay out here because there's no camping in the National Park. It's a good park but they have a pretty bad problemo with dingos at the moment - these cheeky pups trek around looking for food or shoes or camping chairs or pretty much anything they can wrap their mouths around that's left out over night, so buckle down!

There are a few great walks through Kings Canyon at Watarrka National Park. There's a short walk into the middle of the canyon, which gives you a great view of the towering vertical walls and pockets of 'lush' vegetation protected in sheltered gullies amidst the vast and harsh desert that surrounds the Park. But most people take on the canyon rim walk. The sign says this 6.6km walk will take about 3-4 hours (which scared the hell out of Luke and I - we had set our bush walking limit at 2 hours max!). But whether we have somehow managed to become super-humanly fit by sitting on our backsides in the kombi for so many days on end or the information sign was being a tad lenient, either way, Luke and I were back at the carpark, walk completed in an hour and 20 minutes! All those 5 o'clock beers must be giving us extra energy or something?!

It's a beautiful walk and there is so much to see. The contrast between the red earth, the blue sky and the lush greenery is beautiful. Well worth the trip!

Yours in the great outdoors,

Odette