Living next door to Alice. Alice? Who the fuck is Alice?

The West McDonnell Ranges is famous for having a number of beautiful gorges and swimming holes. The first we drove past, Redbank Gorge, has a 45min walk to the swimming hole... can you guess if we went to that one? Answer: did we fuck.

The next two, Glen Helen Gorge and Ormiston Gorge, were very close to each other and both only had a two-minute walk to the swimming hole. We opted for Ormiston Gorge as it had a National Park campground and sounded a bit nicer. As we are out of season the campsite was quite empty, just the way we like it. There was also a kiosk that served lunch and cakes. At the start of this journey I would have balked at a national park with a fucking kiosk in it. I mean, how sell out is that? Jeez, we go to these places to be at one with nature and to get away from the concrete jungle. After four months on the road I loved that I could get a flat white coffee and homemade carrot cake here. We also had a lovely spinifex pigeon wandering around our table.

No cake for you

Oh, how life on the road has changed me.

After the cake, we went for a short walk to the swim hole. Over the past few months the lack of training and poor diet choice is starting to show. I am looking more and more like the contestants from fattest loser after they lost the weight… lots of loose skin. I have a feeling that I have already made that joke, but can’t be fucked to check.

Make a splash, fat boy.

That night, Becky cooked up some of her famous pasta stir-in sauce. Or it might have been her 3-minute noodle dish, I can’t really remember as it was a while ago, but it was definitely one of those, ‘cos that’s all we fucking eat these days.

The next morning we set off on the 4km walk around the gorge. The hardest bit was walking to the lookout, but even that was quite easy.

Pretty place

We were alone for most of the walk and had a lovely dip in a swimming hole deeper into the gorge. 

Trying a new version of solo synchronised swimming

We strolled back very content with our morning ramble. I even tried some rock hopping, but added a bit of parkour by spinning mid air. I really have peeled back the years on this holiday.

Street gymnastics

We visited the kiosk again to have lunch, both of us were looking forward to their homemade lasagne. Unfortunately, they only had one lasagne left, and as it was my birthday a few days ago Becky had it. I had to settle for some honey glazed beef thing with rice, which was ok. Becky said the lasagne was absolutely delicious. We both enjoyed a orange, spongy cake thing for pudding. We liked it here and I now think all national parks should have a kiosk that serves homemade food.

The rest of the day we sat around the campsite in the sweltering heat. We watched lots of different birds around the site, and had a lovely day. The only real drama came late in the day, when we suddenly noticed the 2^nd battery had drained. It had been a hot couple of days and nights, working the fridge a lot harder than normal, and we hadn’t been using the solar panels. We had a bit of panic and fluttered about, before deciding to drive to Glen Helen Gorge to recharge the battery a bit. We hoped that’d be enough keep the fridge running over night.

Another fucking gorge

Luckily this proved enough, and the next morning we headed off for new adventures, fridge running at full tilt keeping the opened jar of pasta stir-in sauce cold… phew! We stopped at Ellery Creek Big Hole for a morning swim. It had cooled significantly over the night and it was a bit fresh in the water. However, I was feeling brave, so jumped in and swam out. What a tough little boy I am.

Wade in the water

Feeling a little gorged out, we headed for our camping spot just outside Alice Springs. We had a hotel booked in Alice Springs for the next day, and didn’t want to waste our precious hotel time doing mundane jobs, so after setting up camp headed into Alice to wash the car, refuel and buy some tasty snacks and beers. Back at the site, we enjoyed the rest of the day drinking in nature.

After a boozy nights sleep, and multiple visits to the toilet to pee, we had one last place to tick off the list before leaving the West MacDonnell Ranges; Simpsons Gap. The gorge has a colony of rare black-footed wallabies, and we were lucky enough to spot one on the rocks.

What makes you so special?

And with that we bid farewell to nature for a few days, and headed for the hotel for a few nights away from the canvas and sleeping on the floor. That night we decided to go all the way and ordered room service, we both had barramundi and chips.

Because I'm worth it

We spent the rest of the night surfing the internet and relaxing… well, Becky did, as I slaved away on the blog.

The next morning I took the car to the mechanic to see what we could do about the engine light. The mechanic used his reader to tell me there were a few sensor problems, and it probably wasn’t worth doing anything now, as it could take a few days and wasn't a big issue. He also told me that the opal fuel they use here is utter shit and should be avoided. He dropped a few other car advice gems, and then charged me $40 for the scan… and he didn’t even give me a print out of the sensor codes I wanted. Admittedly I didn't ask for them, but he should have known.

Feeling upbeat about the car not being quite ready for the scrap yard yet, we spent the rest of the morning doing very little. In the arvo we went into the “city”, but it didn't impress us much apart from a giant picture of a thorny,

Two little cuties

That was enough outside, and we went back to just sit in the room watching bachelorette reruns. It was a brilliant day!

After a tearful goodbye to the room the next morning, we fuelled up, stocked up on pasta stir-in, ate lunch, dropped stuff off to a charity shop (but we don’t want to talk about that) and shipped out towards the NT/SA border.

We spent the night at the last roadhouse on the NT side. Here we discovered that we weren’t allowed to take any of the fruits and vegetables we’d just bought in Alice across the border into SA, because NT pests take all the jobs from the SA pests and just don't get the culture. We had a lot of lettuce and tomato in our sandwiches for dinner that night.

Before or after shot?

The next morning we crossed over into SA, without any fruit or vegetables in the car, honestly officer, because I promise we ate the last of it this morning.

New day, new state.

Becky was there too.