King me - Nico and gang do the not-so-red center

After dropping off and having a couple fun nights out with Kevin, Cameron and Sarah in surprisingly modern Darwin, it was time to head south.  Accompanying me for round three were Andrea, a Canadian friend from Perth, as well as Ida and Elina, Finnish best friends.  Remember that skepticism I had from the start about traveling with three girls?  Entirely unwarranted.  Heaps of fun.

We stopped first at the waterfalls of Litchfield NP, taking a final refreshing dip in the plunge pools in preparation for the desert to come.  A day's driving then got us to the historic Daly Waters pub, home of the most isolated red light in the world.  This was Outback Australia; the cowboy providing entertainment ended with a poem that praised American pride after September 11 and imploring the crowd (some 50 years older than us on average) to take some of that pride in Australia and bring it to glory.  Hopeful Asian immigrants didn't seem to fit in to his vision.

Next we passed through the aptly named Devil's Marbles before hitting Alice Springs, 'The Alice', for some car repairs and Ida's birthday.  One problem though, "Why is the red center so green?"  We had assumed until then that we just weren't in the right part yet, but if the capital of the red center wasn't red, what would be?  Should probably be called the pale green center after the ubiquitous spinifex grass taking over nearly every square inch left bare by the small trees and shrubbery.

Then west into the majestic Macdonnell Ranges, culminating with a sweet hike up and around King's Canyon, site of a famous scene from the cult classic "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert".  I saw the movie at Tim's house the night before leaving on the roadtrip, and I assure you that witnessing the actor made famous by uber-serious roles of Agent Smith and Elrond dancing to Mama Mia in a blue sequined dress is a wonder to behold.

And finally Uluru.  Towering over us.  Over me.  Sitting alone with it, I began to understand the special reverence it inspires in the hearts of its native owners.  Like most other visitors, we complied with their request to not climb the rock.  Instead, we learned about the mala (wallaby) men who first climbed up in an ancient ceremony, the bark carved out of a tree to form simple but powerful spear throwers, and an actual blind mouse (marsupial) that lives underground and carries its pouch on its back.  After, we hopped over to the Olgas, standing tall in the shadow of Uluru. Against the backdrop of the mountains, we saw a kestrel dive from the heights to catch its dinner in flight - the beauty and harshness of the Outback in motion.

A thousand bungled suns - Nico and gang do the Bungle Bungles and Kakadu

"I think we're missing sunset." "It's gonna be an awesome twilight view though." "Yeah." We park. "Alright, only a few people leaving." We walk in. "Ummmm, looks like everyone's leaving." "Suckers. They're gonna miss the sweet twilight." People look at us with pity. We reach the base of the lookout.
A couple fellow backpackers warn us, "The rangers are turning people away, but if you're quick you might get a look."

We're not quick enough; sunset at Ubirr is denied to us. We retreat to the campsite behind the famous aboriginal art site and are immediately attacked by a million mozzies.

This comes as no real surprise, though; sunset just isn't our time. Our first flat tire? Sunset. Our second flat tire? Sunset.

Sunrise isn't much better. We try for one at the Bungle Bungles. Cameron and Sarah don't make it out of the tent; Kevin and I snooze the first alarm. At the second we leap from our tents and are driving within a minute. We can't find the campsite exit and probably wake a dozen families. Finally, we race off. We park and sprint up the hill, gasping for air, certain that we'll miss it. 45 minutes after we reach the top, the sun rises over the rocks. It's nice, especially when Kevin descends and pulls out his guitar, but one thing is obvious: it would have been nicer at sunset.

The days, however are great. Black, white, and orange striped Bungles are spectacular, and Echidna Chasm is impossibly tall and narrow. The drive through Gregory NP has to be one of my favorites, and the aboriginal culture on display in Kakadu is nothing short of fascinating. And, last but certainly not least, the 6 meter massive jumping crocs of the Adelaide River just take my breath away.

From Croc jumping

Nothing but awe for those ancient killing machines.

Check back soon for King me - Nico and gang do the not-so-red center.

White men can jump - Nico and gang do the Gibb River Road

"Let's jump!" "It's definitely deep enough." "Is it deep enough to jump!?" The people swimming below shook their heads. Sharing an amused look with Sarah at the childlike excitement, so did I. We knew that our French and British travelmates, Kevin and Cameron, were a little crazy, but jumping 30+ meters into Bell Gorge was taking it to a whole new level. Half an hour later they leapt. "How was it?" "Amazing. But my bum hurts."

From Broome to Darwin 2

An portly elderly man approaches us. "Good jump?" "Not bad." "I might give it a go." We all laugh at the joke. Ten minutes later we watch in awe as he plummets, framed gloriously by the waterfall. We cheer. The old people cheer louder. "Good on ya!" We have a new hero.

Now with no excuse, I join the boys for a smaller albeit slipperier jump the next day at Manning Gorge. My bum hurts a little bit too.

Check back soon for A thousand bungled suns - Nico and gang do the Bungle Bungles and Kakadu.

Editors note: Some may have misunderstood my earlier post about the photos. My mates never said that they weren't sharing their pictures to punish me; it seemed to be more a matter of selfishness than of malice.  The first one to say it was on great terms with me and deeply apologetic; he just couldn't let go of his 'babies'.  As far as I know, they didn't share with each other either.

Four wheel domination - Nico and gang do the Kimberley

"Are you sure that this is the road?" "Nope" "Are you sure that this is a road?" "Kinda looks like a car's been here before." "You see the 5 foot ditch, right?" "Yep" Cameron wakes up. "Why are we chasing cows?" "Trying to get to a gorge." "Oh" Ten minutes later: "Maybe this is just a path for cows." Five more minutes. "Might be time to turn around."

Thus ended our short-lived attempt to reach Adcock Gorge, one of the many dicey turnoffs off Australia's most famous 4wd track, the Kimberley's Gibb River Road. We didn't care though; creating our own road over jutting rocks and tenuous ditch crossings was just as fun. Four wheel domination.

From Broome to Darwin 2

Going off-road has without a doubt been one of the highlights of the trip, especially from the driver's seat. There's just no feeling like climbing up and down sand dunes until you pull up the last one and face nothing between you and the ocean. Or diving headlong into rivers that you pray aren't too deep and feeling a moment of panic as the headlights go beneath the water before breathing a collective sigh of relief as you inch up the opposite bank. Or pitching to the left and right as you clamber over boulders as big as wallabies (or an actual wallaby in Kevin's case) and landing with a thud back onto Earth. Or taking any possible road to the beach to seek shelter in the dunes from the wind and the roving eyes of rangers, finding a private spot miles away from any other sentient minds. And, of course, visiting the beautiful spots many backpackers are forced to skip, not just the Gibb River Road but also Francois Peron, Red Bluff and Gnaraloo, the back road to Cape Range, Karijini, and most recently the World Heritage listed Bungle Bungles and Kakadu.

There are some downsides though. In the past week I've gone from never having changed a flat tyre in my life to changing two. Some days we'd open the trunk and discover that everything was covered in dust. Other times we'd stumble out of the car reeling with headaches from severely corrugated roads. Once we hit a bump so hard that the car suddenly died. A few minutes of panic ensued until we determined with the help of two friends we'd met the week before, who just happened to be driving by, that one power cable had simply come loose. And dealing with the air pressure in the tyres, though quite manly, can be dangerous guesswork and a pain to constantly adjust.

But I love it. We all do. And so does King Dave - it's what he was born to do. Half the time it feels like we're in a commercial for Jeep; I'll load up some of those videos up when I get a chance.

Check back soon for White men can jump - Nico and gang do the Gibb River Road.

A bang and a whimper - Nico and gang do Broome

Some trips end with a bang, others with a whimper. This one had both.

After sleeping near some massive termite nests on the way out of Exmouth, we made our way to Karijini's stunning gorges where emerging differences in schedules and travel styles led to some frayed emotions. I tried to be fair and reasonable, but underlying frustrations and, though it was never said aloud, I think different understandings of proper respect as well, drove wedges into our fun as deep as the gorges we clambered through. Patches were attempted as we left the park but a cool undercurrent persisted on the long drive to Broome via 80 mile beach.

First came the bang. Our most interesting night of the trip materialized from thin air when we bravely followed the sounds of reggae music on an empty street to crash an aboriginal/islander holiday party. Somewhat fearful at first, our initial hesitation was put to rest as we were greeted with open arms, genuine good cheer, some funky dancing, and delicious food and drinks (though the turtle and dugong cooking in the traditional manner beneath the soil were for family consumption only). Even that, though, wasn't enough to save us; we agreed the next day that the two who had been planning on staying with me would remain in Broome as I continued on. We hoped that it would enable us to end on a positive note.

I walk to a nearby hostel, hoping to put a sign up advertising my new lift offer; I now have three spots to fill and still hope to leave tomorrow. There's someone already standing there. "Looking for a lift to Darwin?" I ask hopefully; "You're kidding me" comes the reply. "Nope." "You have room for my friend?" "Hell yah."

Within half an hour my new team was assembled. I was on a high.

The whimper came that night, the last we were to spend together. One by one, my friends told me that they didn't want to share their pictures with me as we'd originally agreed and repeated throughout the journey. Those were the pictures I had been planning to share with you; my own camera had been broken from the start. I'm sorry to say that now I have none to display. Though sorely disappointed, I hope that the incident doesn't continue to cloud all my good memories of our adventure.

Check back soon for Four wheel domination - Nico and gang do the Kimberley.

Happy little whalesharks - Nico and gang do Ningaloo Reef

"Happy little whalesharks" sang the girls in their highest voices; "Happy little whalesharks" followed the guys in their deepest. It was a wacky end to an awesome day of snorkeling with those majestic fish that are anything but little; the biggest fish in the sea, whalesharks are thought to grow up to 18 meters long. Even the juveniles we swam with - which, being inquisitive, truth to bump us with their enormous heads to figure out what we were - were 3 meters long. Awesome.

The whaleshark expedition was the finale of a weeklong snorkel-fest up the Ningaloo reef (named a world heritage site the day of our whalesharking) that also featured six huge sea turtles (one I kept up with for at nearly 10 minutes), a reef shark, and world-class coral. And twice when I seriously feared for my life: the first after swimming past two sets of breaking waves in Lefroy Bay to see what was on the other side (toes were bleeding after fighting my way back through those) and the second while bring caught in the menacing currents of innocent-sounding Turquoise Bay. The only thing that kept me from panicking was the sight of a man watching me from the shore, a stone's throw from the life preserver placed there for situations like mine. When I finally crawled, gasping, onto the beach, he said, "I didn't think that you were going to make it." When he showed me where I'd fought from, I understood why.

Though we've never resorted to the French Market ("When you steal from a supermarket," told us a French girl in Carnarvon who's brother had just been caught. "Every French person does it"), we have become quite creative getting our supplies at times. Best was at Red Bluff, when, after enjoying the stunning sunset, we ran out of gas mid-dinner and traded cupcakes for a can of butane and collected firewood (comically and illegally) in exchange for some special pizza from a group of surfers. And after camping for free on beaches all up the coast, we (despite my protests) camped one night in a park in town, were caught by the police who luckily didn't fine us, and ended up in a limestone quarry instead.

Check back soon for A bang and a whimper - Nico and gang do Broome

Did somebody order a krabby patty? - Nico and gang do Monkey Mia

Our next destination was Monkey Mia, made famous by a few families of wild dolphins that gamely head to the shore nearly every morning to interact with the locals. As usual, the journey proved more than we bargained for.
After a brief stop to see millenia-old stromatolites, which are about as exciting as their name suggests, we got some bait and took one of our trip's many unmarked off-road dirt paths; this one, uniquely, led to a beach comprised entirely of little white shells. Armed with my fishing rod and some thawing squid, Chuck and I head off into the water, into the sunset, in search of dinner. We figured we'd get thigh deep before casting the line. So we walked. And walked. 200 meters out we hit what looked to be a sand bar but was also just shells. Kept on walking; the only thing that got deeper were our feet, which sank well into the mud with every step. After a luckless hour of casts, we returned to find that the girls had prepared tea and cookies for us - we were already falling into gender stereotypes. This only got clearer later when the guys built a fire after breaking some of the biggest branches by driving over them with the 4wd. Beast.

In Francois Peron National Park, we caught some beautiful fish and spotted rays, sharks,dolphins, and turtles from a sweet lookout. It was going pretty smoothly (besides a hasty retreat from the water after a shark sighting at our beach and backing up King Dave into the camping table which somehow managed to survive - "cruuuunch" "Is that the table?") until we decided to take the shovel out the second evening to hunt for crabs. Miraculously, we found a huge one in its hole on the second try. Shocked, Chuck asked, "What do we do now?" "Hit it with the shovel!" I replied in line with our plan from the start. Whack. Crab down. Suddenly, Leila shouts, "What are we going to do with it now!?" Before I have time to respond with the obvious, "We eat it," Chuck lifts the crab up with the shovel, chucking it as far as he can into the ocean. Once we stopped laughing, I asked, "What'd you do that for?" "I don't know, I just panicked."

We never caught another crab.

Check back soon for Happy little whalesharks - Nico and gang do the Ningaloo Reef.

And special shout-out to our latest hero, Grant, an auto-electrician who rescued us on a Saturday afternoon when everything was closed to fix not just our brake lights but half a dozen other issues as well. And a couple more things Monday morning. And he did them well, providing good company and welcome advice to boot. When we tried to pay, he accepted only a token amount - "I know what it's like to be on the road". If you're ever in Broome and want to rent a car, you're in good hands with Grant. Cheers mate.

Camping on the beach - Nico and gang do Kalbarri

After a three day test run down south with Chuck and Maya to surfing and wine mecca Margaret river that featured some friendly Taiwanese who'd just bought a broken car, getting shown up in the waves by a 14 year old girl surfing champion, climbing a 75 meter tree with a wicked view, snorkeling for stingrays, and an overly friendly possum at our campsite, the full group assembled in Perth for our full departure (once I'd finished up my final project at UWA and had a surprise goodbye party courtesy of Tim).

Our first destination was Kalbarri national park, a small corner of the coast cut with beautiful gorges and clouded only by the bad weather we had when passing through.  Though the park was nice and our impromptu ballroom and salsa dance party at a hostel outside the park (with a middle-aged Australian man and a Dutch girl) was certainly entertaining, what should have been a simple day and a half drive to Kalbarri ended up being most memorable as an introduction in dramatic fashion to what were to become two of the strongest recurring themes of our trip - getting help from very friendly Australians and doing stupid things.  Though the help has come from Aussies of all shapes and forms, like the  young recently divorced tyre mechanic in Geraldton who directed us to free camping on the beach in the one spot that the rangers don't check - "I've used it quite a few times in the last couple months" - and the disembodied voice that called out to us with an offer of a covered clothesline as we hung our wet clothes on a tree in a caravan park (we found where it came from on the third try), most of it has been from elderly folks with big hearts and accumulated wisdom from several trips around the country.  We were about to meet the first of those now.

As we approached what we thought would be a free campsite at Sandy Cape, we noticed a sign requiring payment for the night.  Confused, we decided to check out the site first and drove to the far end where we thought we'd have the most privacy.  Noticing a entry spot to the beach, we decided to go for it; why have a car with four wheel drive if we're not going to use it?  Despite my very limited 4wd experience, I knew to instruct our current driver to put the car in 4 low while I locked the wheels.  For the first 20 seconds,  it was awesome.  Then the car stopped moving.

We got out and, sure enough, we'd driven far too close to the water and the tires were stuck deep into the sand.  The driver got nervous, so it was up to me to try to get us out.  I tried to back it up as far as I could, but we reached a point where the wheels were spinning, the engine was coughing, and we just weren't going anywhere.  And the tide was inching closer towards us.  The panic was too.

Suddenly, four figures appeared out of the night.  An older couple and a younger couple who'd heard our noisy attempts up at their campsites and guessed correctly what was going on.  The men got our shovel out and started getting to work while the women chatted on the side.  As they pushed and I continued to try to reverse, one asked, "Did you put the engine in 4 low or 4 high?"  "4 low, is that wrong?"  "No, that's right; just sounds like it's in 4 high."  Sure enough, the driver had put it in the wrong gear.  Fixing that, finally things began improving.

But that still wasn't enough.  After a few more minutes, Terry, the pensioner, told me,  "If you don't want the ocean to take your car, you've got to let air out of the tyres."  I'd known that reducing tyre pressure was important for driving on rocky roads; I hadn't realized that it was even more important for driving on sand.  Finally free, we thanked our saviors and went, a little shaken, to a site right next to the beach that Terry directed us to.

In the morning, we got some visitors - Terry and his wife had walked over to check on us and invite us to their trailer for morning coffee.  When we'd packed up and drove over to find them, the wife was standing on the road waving us over and Terry had his pump to refill our tires already out and ready to go.  They shared some travel tips along with the coffee, loving every minute of it, until finally saying, "What are you doing staying here listening to us?  Drive off, explore, have some fun!"  Comforted that the magnitude of our stupidity was outweighed only by the generosity of our hosts, we did.