10 - Alice Springs, MacDonnell Ranges 16th- 29th August

Entry 10 – Alice Springs – East & West MacDonnell Ranges 16^th – 29^th August.

It had been ten years since we had last experienced the charm of the MacDonnell Ranges located on the eastern and western side of the township of Alice Springs. We decided to start out, setting camp in the Eastern MacDonnell Ranges at Trephina Gorge. It was a great setting and there was plenty of early morning bird activity welcoming us.

 

There were three nearby campgrounds and all three were at capacity when we arrived at around 7.30am, even with an outside temperature of only 3C degrees. We were the first arrivals for the day (or the most stupid ones for getting up so bloody early in the biting cold) with several other new arrivals not long after, lining up behind us. We walked around all the camp sites and there was very little movement from the occupants, possibly something to do with the near freezing morning temperature. With more arrivals, people were getting anxious wanting a site and weren’t interested in waiting their turn driving around others into the campground making a nuisance of themselves. We ended up driving onto part of the vacating site we had been patiently waiting for while the occupants were still packing up, to negate some rude behaviour by queue jumpers.

It was 2021 the second year of the covid-19 pandemic with people still not allowed to travel overseas for holidays. It was reiterated this was the most crowded we had ever seen tourist destinations in Australia with a huge influx of people who needed supervision, whom most probably would normally travel overseas. We were wishing for a speedy conclusion to this pandemic, enabling the return to overseas guided tours with a resumption of controlled people activities! Grrr.

Trephina Gorge oozed with charisma in a great setting. There were several walks available. Our first trail experience, the Panorama Walk travelled along one of the peaks overlooking the camp ground. It provided plenty of pleasing scenery making for a most satisfactory walk.

There was a water tap in each camp ground with various open plastic containers on the ground at the tap bases, providing a water point for the local birds. Whenever we obtained some water for our own use, we would top up the bird’s water containers. It was such an enjoyable pastime watching the bird life around these water locations, we placed a container from out of our caravan nearby in the bushes at our camp site. It didn’t take long for the word to get around with the bird population about a new water point and we enjoyed watching the increasing volume of bird activities from our caravan door step. Even though the best activity was during the crisp early mornings.

There was a nine-kilometre trail titled The Ridgetop Trail starting from the campground but unfortunately finishing at another campground around eight kilometres down the road. We were chatting with a young couple who offered us a lift in their vehicle to the other campground on their way out the following morning and we gratefully accepted. It was classified as a difficult walk which it was, for a few sections. We took our time, regularly stopping, admiring the scenery and providing our bodies with an appropriate fuel intake, helping to keep up our energy levels. It was a great walk with constant, fabulous scenery. About five hours later we arrived back at our camp all tuckered out feeling rather fatigued.

There was a water hole near the start of the Ridgetop Trail which we explored prior to initializing the start of our walk.

Some of our recordings of the scenery along the Ridgetop Trail.

 

About 10 kilometres further down the road was the Ross River Resort. There was an optus phone network hot spot at Ross River and we spent a couple of hours there attending to some phone calls (booking our next camp spot, continuing with the saga of trying to source new caravan batteries, etc.) They had a nice caravan park with a setting similar to Trephina Gorge and there were some great stools at the resort’s bar.

We could have easily extended our time at Trephina Gorge but after four nights we relocated to the Alice Springs Show Grounds. We had pre-arranged to catch up with Mary’s brother who lives at Alice Springs and also one of her school friends, who was travelling north with an overnight stopover at Alice Springs for a night. We spent time during the afternoon catching up with Sandra and June, finishing with an evening meal at the casino. The following day we spent lunch with Michael at his local club. It was a busy social calendar for a couple of days providing some good sleeping medication.

The climate of central Australia is suitable for long term storage of aircraft. We had previously seen some of the international aircraft stored at Alice Springs Airport from the ground. Whilst at Edith Falls, we met a young lad who provided some photographs he had taken on a helicopter flight over Alice Springs Airport showing some of about 300 planes stored there during the covid-19 pandemic period. Storage costs were at $5,000 AU per week where technicians maintained the required upkeep of the planes. We thank Mark for providing these pictures and permitting us to utilize them for this record of our travels.

Whilst in Alice Springs we took advantage of the good internet/phone reception available at this populated location. We attended to lots of electronic required “stuff,” including bill payments, blog edition uploads, touching base via the phone with family and friends. After two busy days we were yearning for a beautiful, peaceful national park setting. Our next targeted stopover was in the West MacDonnell Ranges at Ellery Creek campground.

On route to Ellery Creek, we stopped at Simpsons Gap for a look. It was a most magnificent setting where we were unable to capture this stunning setting within the lens of our camera. There were a lot of budgerigars flying back and forth through the gap in the gorge. We sat down, patiently waiting for a nearby photographic opportunity to capture the bird activity. It was incredibly satisfying viewing.

 

It was another 70 kilometres down the road from Simpsons Gap to Ellery Creek. We saw many caravans and campers heading in the opposite direction. It was a Sunday and we were hopeful the weekend campers were heading home leaving vacant camp sites. We arrived at Ellery Creek around mid-day and the campground was full. Damn! We managed to snuggle in behind another caravan parked up in a wide bit of road circumnavigating around the campground for the night.

Ellery Creek is noted for its big water hole and it was a popular location for day visitors and its setting seemed to attract people to it’s nearby camp ground.

Late afternoon we participated in the Dolomite Walk from the campground, a circuit walk about three kilometres in length. Once again, we were stretching our necks in all directions enjoying magnificent scenery.

Early the following morning we opened the caravan door to see the moon sinking below the peaks of our surrounding ranges.

The sun needed to be quite high to penetrate past the peaks surrounding Ellery Creek Big Hole. Early morning, the water hole felt gloomy and cold, even though we could feel the warmth from the sun’s rays away from the gorge. There were still a few onlookers about.

 

The Bureau of Meteorology had forecast a daily temperature drop of about 10 degrees for the next 5 days. On this occasion their forecast prediction had been correct with a change in weather accompanied by a strong cold wind. We stayed indoors within the comfortable confines of our caravan for most of the following day, provided with plenty of entertainment from watching “people,” movement from our nice warm environment. In the afternoon we stretched out, walking the Dolomite Walk again. It felt far more pleasant, exercising in the cooler conditions with our bodies cruising along its circuit without feeling fatigued. It was amazing the different effect on our bodies the warmer conditions of the previous day had impacted.

The following morning our constant beautiful blue skies had become inhibited by a covering of clouds. Even then, the sun was doing a splendid job beaming its rays down through the clouds.

About 40 kilometres down the road our next stop was at Ormiston Gorge. We set camp and headed out along the Ormiston Gorge Pound Walk Loop. The scenery was wonderful, sparkling in our eyes, dulling the effect of the workout our bodies were experiencing. It was another one of those rather lengthy walks at around 9-kilometers in a hilly, rocky environment.

A few kilometres into the pound walk there was a small deviation up to the pound look out with outstanding views. We spent some extended time admiring this most magnificent, oh wow, view.

The trail continued, still skirting the outer perimeter of the pound. In the distance we could see a gap in the pound wall where the trail entered into the pound. The below pictures show this section of the walk with the first picture showing the highlighted colour to look out for. The dots near the lower right, in the following pictures, show the progress of this highlighted colour towards the pound, indicating in a small way the enormous size of the MacDonnell Ranges.

Once inside the pound we found a rock to sit and admire its beauty from a ground level perspective for a period of time before continuing along the trail.

Leaving the pound terrain, we entered into the confines of Ormiston Gorge with its huge walls getting closer and closer, closing inwards upon us. We felt dwarfed by the size of the gorge walls towering high above us.

We tried and tried to capture in our photographs the setting that was tantalising our eyes. Unfortunately, none of our photographs were able to replicate our vision of the Ormiston Gorge Pound Walk. The last couple of kilometres the defined trail disappeared into the gorge floor and you were required to rock hop along the base of the dry Ormiston Creek bed. These last couple of kilometres were rather taxing on already tired aging legs which included a water crossing wetting our knees. There were no personal photographs along this section as we were concentrating on our foot placement amongst the rocks. There were a few water holes where we stopped to watch the bird activities.

The Ormiston Pound Hike tantalized all our good senses. It was simply superb. We did remember to take a final picture looking back at our route as we were leaving the gorge.

Another enjoyable walk at Ormiston Gorge was the Ghost Gum walk. Again, no photograph was able to display the enormous vista captivating our eyes at Ormiston Gorge, a small bit of the MacDonnell Ranges.

The morning after our pound walk, our bodies were feeling a bit sluggish. We decided to let the tow tug take us for a drive to view some of the scenery down the road a bit. Redbank Gorge sounded nice. Its campgrounds looked inviting but there was a need to drive to access any walking trails or special scenic locations. The Redbank Gorge Walk seemed like a nice option to gently massage our bodies with a 1.2 kilometre walk each way. The first 800 metres of the walk had little effect on our bodies but the rest of the way was along the dry water coarse bed without any defined track involving lots of rock hopping and our tired body parts protested.

At least the scenery provided good karma, lessening the impact from some groaning body parts with plenty to look around at. Once again, no photograph could capture the beauty radiating before our eyes. We have placed a yellow dot near our bodies to help display the magnitude of the setting.

 

We liked the setting of the Finke River camping area and decided to relocated there, about a 10-kilometre drive from Ormiston Gorge.

We were quite relaxed at the Finke River camping location. The camping area consisted of about a 2 kilometre stretch along the edge of the river without any defined camp spots and no facilities. It was still under the control of National Parks with official signage displayed at the entrance track. There was lots of soft river sand about, regularly inhibiting the movement of vehicles. We had driven around prior, assessing the suitability of many optional tracks for safely bringing our caravan in. We set camp at a spot about a kilometre in from the main road without the need to lower our tyre pressures. It was a delightful setting enticing regular conversation with other nearby, happy campers.

Glen Helen Gorge was located nearby on the other side of the main road from our Finke River camp site. It provided us with incentive for a nice walk nearby the river to view the gorge. There were no defined access tracks to get close to the gorge. Though we did attempt several possibilities.

Camped on the banks of the Finke River provided an appreciable soul calming atmosphere. It was time for us to head south with about 1,500 kilometres of travel to cover over the next 5 days. It was great to be able to commence a long journey with a relaxed state of mind helped along by the ambiance of the Finke River with a background setting of the MacDonnell Ranges.