The alarm goes off at the depressingly early time of 0430. We have a flight two hours later. As we pack the last of our belongings, I can hear the rain beating down outside. A cyclone is forecast for later this week, so it’s an excellent time to be leaving.
We land, confusingly, at Ayres Rock Airport on time. The reason for my confusion is Ayres Rock has been referred to as Uluru for over 20 years (clearly much longer by the earlier inhabitants). However, Ayres Rock Airport is referred to as … Ayres Rock Airport. This is a shame, since if nothing else, a change would have allowed it to have the acronym UUU.
Anyway, it’s in the low 30′s when we arrive and not a cloud in sight.
A short coach transfer later and we’re at the resort near the Rock. Checked in, we have around four hours to kill before we get escorted around some of the local sites. Lunch will be a priority – but out in the outback, vegetarian seems to be something people probably hunt rather than offer.
The hotel restaurants offer no option for lunch. The lunchtime sandwich bar choices are grim. There’s a “Mediterranean” themed place, Geckos,which as well as emitting an odious smell of beef fat, provides the following useful information …
Our emergency staple isn’t available here.
There’s a supermarket, allowing us to assemble a packed lunch (seeded rolls with hummus, tomatoes and alfalfa sprouts).
We hold off for a while before deciding what we’ll do for dinner…..
…. which takes all of another 15 minutes as we search the rest of the menus available to us. We could spend around $AU58 each on a buffet of salad or….
…. we could go back to the supermarket and see what’s available that won’t need cooking.
Back in the room, Mr “T” is pimping himself by endorsing some revolutionary cooking appliance. The magic-oven or something.
Apparently it utilises halogen, infra red and convection (though kids, convection is surely a given).
Irrespective of the physics involved, it will cook everything from frozen, perfectly, instantly and is available to you in four instalments of some amount. Mr T might like it, but I ain’t going on no magic-oven.
Some brain cells destroyed, it’s time to get picked up again as we head for Kata Tjuta and the Walpa Gorge.
It’s just below 40°. We walk around for around an hour getting fried and drinking copious amounts of water.
It’s then another 40km or so to Uluru, where we watch the sunset.
We also watch the free wine … and get through an undisclosed number of glasses.
Back at the hotel, it’s time to indulge in our home made dinner (courtesy of the aforementioned supermarket). Tonight’s treat is …
Three bean salad (from a tin), with some added red onion and fresh tomato … and … generic pot noodle (with some help from the kettle). Bean salad good. Generic pot noodle bad, very bad. After Eighteen hours on the go, it’s time to stop. What’s on TV? Daddy Day Care. Time for sleep.
