Alice Springs - Yulara - day 25

We had to get up at 5h30 this morning cause we were gonna be picked up at 6h. After thinking we had missed our bus and would be stuck in Alice Springs for another 3 days, they finally picked us up at 6h20. On the bus we met lots of people, mostly from Germany, but also from Australia, France and England. Our guide was called Tanja and she was very nice and fun! We drove for about 5 hours on the Stuart Highway (that goes from Adelaide to Darwin) and another road, stopping every now and then at a camel farm, to collect firewood and to get fuel. The funny thing about Australian service stations is that they almost all have an enclosure with kangaroos, emus, camels, birds, etc. Like a tiny zoo wherever you stop! One of the saddest things about the highway (it's just a one lane road, not an actual highway like in Europe) is the amount of dead kangaroos along the side of them. You actually see a lot more dead kangaroos than you see live ones. They mostly get runover by road trains which are big trucks with 3 or 4 trailers that drive at night and that cannot break due to their weight. So instead, they have big buffalo bars at the front that just knock the kangaroos out of their way. The dead kangaroos attract a lot of birds that come to feed on them. That is how we saw lots of wedgetailed eagles. They are Australia's largest bird of prey, with a wingspan of about 2,1 meters! They live in pairs and if one of them gets killed, the other one will die of 'voluntary' starvation... On our way we passed by Mount Conner, also known as Fuluru cause a lot of people think it's Uluru (aboriginal name for Ayer's Rock). Then we finally saw Uluru and headed to our camp to have lunch. Breakfast at 6h and lunch at 14h30 is tough! After lunch we went to Kata Tjuta (a.k.a. The Olgas) and walked through the Valley of Winds (which they close when it's more than 36 degrees; it was 33 when we were there). Kata Tjuta is a rock formation that's pretty impressive. It was a nice although exhausting walk, but we saw two euros (kind of small kangaroo) and took some nice pics. After that we drove back to Uluru and watched the sunset while drinking champagne and having some snacks! It was amazing to see the colors of the rock change. Then we headed back to our camp and had dinner. We slept in a swag, which looks like a kind of sardine tin, but basically is a matress to sleep outside. So we actually did sleep outside under the stars!! An amazing experience!!

Weather: very very hot and sunny