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The Long Haul to Alice Springs
Reluctantly leaving Wilpena Pound, I made one last stop in the park. Arkaroo Rock is a small cave that was used as a ceremonial center by the Adnyamathanha people, who had painted the walls with figures that told the story of Akurra and the creation of Wilpena Pound. It was about a half-hour hike to the cave, through beautiful open desert, with the outside walls of the Pound rising in the distance. I sat quietly outside the cave for awhile, savoring the ancient significance of this hidden, remote spot.
I drove back down the highway, passing through Hawker and Quorn again, until I reached the Stuart Highway, the main north-south axis of central Australia. Driving north, I knew I had hundreds of kilometres of emptiness ahead of me, but it turned out to be a spectacular eerie emptiness, a landscape of blue skies, dry lakes and vast vistas of endless desert. The highway was empty as well, except for the occasional road-train that would pass by me with the force of a hurricane.
Just before sunset I reached Coober Pedy, the largest town between Port Augusta and Alice Springs, but still not much more than a couple of gas stations and a few stores. Coober Pedy is in the center of the largest opal mining district in the world, and most of its residents make their living underground, in the thousands of small mines that surround the town. The town is famous for its underground homes, stores, and hotels, and the name itself is an Aboriginal term meaning "white man's hole in the ground."
I spent the night in Coober Pedy, in one of the underground hotels. My room looked like a cave, with undulating fake-rock walls, low ceilings, and a small boulder for a nightstand. Other than that, it had all the amenities of a motel room - TV, shower, hot water, coffee machine, and a little tray of instant coffee and tea. After dinner in a Greek restaurant, I went back to my cave to watch TV before going to bed.
The next morning I continued north, as clouds began to move across the sky. The landscape was as dry and parched as ever, but I was clearly driving into a desert rainstorm. The clouds became darker and more foreboding as I drove further north, and by the time I had reached the border of South Australia and Northern Territory, it had begun to rain. It wasn't a very strong rain, but enough to make me slow down from my usual 130 kph pace.
I reached Alice Springs late in the afternoon, while the rain continued to come down in a light drizzle. I checked into a motel in the center of town and decided to go for a walk in the rain. The main street of central Alice Springs is Todd Street, a pedestrian mall with a lot of small shops and restaurants. I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering through the galleries of Aboriginal art, as well as the T-shirt shops and kitschy souvenir stores.
That night I had dinner in an Aboriginal restaurant, which had a classic Australian menu. It featured kangaroo, wallaby, crocodile, as well as a number of animals I had never heard of. I played it safe and ordered the fish, a beautiful filet of barramundi steamed in banana leaves.
The next morning the rain had stopped and the skies had cleared completely. I got up early and went for a short walk to the top of Anzac Hill, which affords a beautiful view of Alice Springs and the MacDonnell Ranges of mountains which surround the city. In the distance is the Heavitree Gap in the MacDonnell Ranges, which according to a Dreaming story, was carved by the crawling Yeperenye, Ntyarlke, and Utnerrengatye caterpillars.
Next up: Watarrka (Kings Canyon)
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