Sunday 28 July 2013 – Palm Valley, Hermensberg Mission, Ormiston Gorge

In the morning Bill showed us many sights to enjoy in Kakadu.  

Driving into Hermansberg, we saw the old mission and realised that it was Sunday so popped in to the Lutheran Mission Church and joined in the service – held in English and Aranda, the language of the Western Aranda people.  

Afterward we had a chat with Colin who told us about the history of the Mission, then went and viewed over the old mission church, school and buildings.  The Mission provided protection for the indigenous people when the pastoralists were killing them off and fought for aboriginal rights and the protection of their language.  This mission was fortunate to have two long term pastors who were interested in preserving the language and fighting for rights for the Aranda people, even though it went against government policy and lost government funding for some time.  It was unlike other missions who abused their position of trust.

Namajina learnt his painting craft here.

Leaving the Mission we encountered wild brumbies playing in a waterhole.

We then entered Gross Bluff Crater “Tnorala” formed from a comet or large meteorite then impact is estimated to have been the equivalent of millions of times that of the atomic bomb at Hiroshima.  Although a rich source of food, due to death and destruction of clans due to fighting, the area is no longer inhabited.

Visited Red Bank George – nice but not very special.

This picture shows why the indigenous people invented dot painting.

Called in at Glen Helen’s Resort to set tyre pressures back up to normal as we are now back on sealed roads and treated ourselves to a sausage roll and an icypole – Mel really enjoyed the icypole as it was such a nice change from bore water.

Moved on to Ormiston George for camping at night.

Saturday 27 July 2013 – Palm Valley relaxing, walking and more damper

Loved it so much we decided to stay another day – slept in.

Played guitar, lunch then off on the Marpeena walk through another valley then up a steep saddle to the top with beautiful views over many valleys.  The climb down was a bit hairy in parts but we made it down safely.

Relaxing afternoon playing guitar, blues harp and Mel on her harp – then playing together.  Walk along the creek.

At night we again enjoyed fire and conversation with Bill and Anita, and when it was damper time, Mel produced her surprise - gluten free, dairy free damper with sultanas cooked in the dream pot and finished off in Bill’s camp oven – not quite a match for the real thing but a real surprise and nice to join in the bake off and share what we had with them too.

The dingos has a feast that night as they ran off with someone’s steak, then ran off with Bill and Anita’s butter and honey – you just can’t leave anything out for a minute!  We were able to supply Bill and Anita with some of our butter and honey. 

Friday 26 July 2013 – Kings Canyon and Palm Valley Walk

Just left the camping area and are travelling around the Red Centre Way on the Mereenie loop on dirt roads.  We need special permit as traveling through Aboriginal land on our way to Palm Valley in the Fink Gorge National Park.  Lots of 4WDdiving on the way to the camp ground through river bed and sand. After the campground we made it 3klms up to the start of the Palm Valley walk which needed a high clearance vehicle – the guys in the campground were amazed that we had been able to make it that far in our VW. 

Walking through the valley we saw the red cabbage palms (only place on earth that these grow naturally), water holes and more cycads.  Beautiful scenery and spied a black footed rock wallaby standing sentinel high in the cliffs above us.

Such a beautiful spot to camp near a small creek and in the bush, $6.60ea with toilets, solar showers and 4 bbqs that all worked – the rangers do such a good job here.

At night we met a lovely family of 7, Bill Anita and their children, who shared damper with us over one of the communal fire pits.  Another man Graham came over and competed with them for the best dampers – so there was a bake off – yummy – Mel abstained (not gluten free) but helped with the judging.

Thursday 25 July 2013 – Curtain Springs to Kings Canyon

Thanks again Curtain Springs for the free camping and hot showers.

God’s really on a roll with us at the moment.  Last night we pulled into the free campground at dusk and swung into the same spot we were in 2 days ago.  While there was plenty of room around our van, the man (our nearest neighbour) barked out grumpily to us to move our van back so he didn’t have to look at it!  Later, when just starting to watch a DVD of Ms Fisher’s murder mysteries before 9pm we had a knocking on our window and the man shouting at us to turn it down as he couldn’t sleep.  I thought I’d have a few words with him later on and we lay in bed in the morning chuckling about him.  Our reading this morning came from James 3 talked about wisdom – needing it, getting it and displaying it – some of the qualities included living at peace with those around us.  So I did have a few words with the neighbour – to apologise for disturbing them last night.  I need God and me to work a lot more on my attitudes!

Travelling to Kings Canyon the scenery changed with vastly less desert oaks and more scrub like trees then more mature desert oaks and finally escarpments covered with trees.

Fantastic views walking around the Kings Canyon Ridge walk - lots of wildflowers too.  

Lots of beehive domes called the Lost City.

The Garden of Eden in Kings Canyon was very special with palms, waterholes, and cycads surviving since dinosaur times.

Mel’s sore knee is standing up to the 100’s of steps up and down the canyons – must have been all the practice she had climbing up and down our stairs while packing up our house to rent.

Back to the camping ground at King’s resort for the night.  While sitting in the campground with my guitar a van pulled up alongside and a lady said do you want to play on stage with us tonight – they were the musos who were playing at the Thirsty Dingo Pub/BBQ room – I didn’t.  They informed us that there would be a Mongolian Throat singer on at 8pm so we headed over after dinner.  It was the same performer we heard at the National Folk Festival last year.  He was great and played his horsehair fiddle as well. How amazing to see him out in the bush keeping the audience spellbound.

Kings Canyon resort won the prize so far for the most items not in working order! – This really tried our new resolve of “to blessed to complain” – however did report very dangerous gas leaking bbq that would have blow you sky high if you tried to use it.

Wednesday 24 July 2013 – Walking around Uluru then back to Curtain Springs

Woke up early and off to Uluru to go with the park ranger on the Marla walk at the base of the rock.  

He took about 2 hours to explain the history of the indigenous people the “Anangu’ people who lived around Uluru for generations, and explained their culture - including before and after meeting European explorers and settlers. 

The good news is that much of their culture and language are intact with the men going off for men’s business for up to several months at a time.  He also explained how the Anangu people cared for the land via patch burning to encourage the right vegetation for their food and also to develop the right habitat for animals and other creatures.  He explained the geology of the region and how the rock was formed and tilted up.

Mel and I walked around part of the base spending some time at the Mutijulu waterhole listening to the water, birds and insects and enjoying the warmth of the sun out of the wind.  It is a lot different to when I was here with my children back in 2006 when the rain hit Uluru and the water just gushed off the rock forming amazing waterholes at the base of the rock.

To our friends at Solidarity – it was a very special experience for us to be able to sing Mantaku in the place where it belongs and as a celebration of the land being given back to its rightful owners.

The ranger also explained how important it was not to climb Uluru:

·         Safety - 35 people have died climbing it and rangers have to regularly rescue and helicopter people off the rock;

·         Environment - many phones, cameras and other items are dropped over and the pollution from these batteries and peoples excrement all flows down into the waterholes when it rains and affects the animals, vegetation and the Anangu people who eat them.

·         Sensitive site – climbing the rock to the Anangu people is basically desecrating an object with great religious significance to them. 

Visited the Visitors Centre and viewed the art work from different indigenous peoples and saw some cultural dancing.

Leaving Uluru, Mel and I were having a good winge to each other about the Ayres Rock Resort campground and filled out online survey re $ vs lack of facilities - and quite a few things that had gone wrong there.  We then decided to do our reading from the Bible, and wouldn’t you know it but the reading was Psalm 73 about always being grateful and thankful.  God spoke to us about our winging attitude and words and the need to be thankful for what we have - doesn’t He always seems to put his finger right on the very things that need attention in our lives!  The guy who wrote the notes accompanying the reading said that he’d seen a bumper sticker saying “To blessed to complain” – which really sums up our situation.

Lovely BBQ for dinner at the back of the store – here they provide free use of their bbq facilities and open area to sit down to eat and relax.  There are many aviaries where you can view birds indigenous to the area and a huge cactus - the photo of Mel beside it provides scale.

Great moon again tonight – too photo and then on close up looking at the photo we could clearing see the moon’s craters – amazing.