Alice, also known as "the Alice" and Alice Springs, is located in Australia's geographic center. Whenever we have talked about visiting Australia, Alice Springs frequently comes up in conversation. Naturally, during Spaswinefood's recent Australian road trip we visited Alice. How could we resist visiting Alice! Besides, isn't Ayers Rock (Uluru), Australia's iconic landmark nearby?
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| Alice Springs, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
Alice Springs, the third largest town in Australia's Northern Territory, is a remote town. This popular gateway to Australia's Red Centre, with a population of just over 28,000, is located 1,500 km from the nearest major town. Yes, Alice Springs is way out there.
Journey to Alice, Australia's Red Centre
Our half-lap around Australia, a three month road trip, took us from Melbourne through Southern and Western Australia, to Darwin, at the "Top End", back down through Central Australia to Adelaide and then onto Melbourne. All the literature suggested avoid Central Australia in the summer. We did. In fact, as we greeted the arrival of winter, we spent the second last week of our Australian adventure in Central Australia. As we travelled southwards Australians escaping winter in the Southeastern Australia passed us, as they headed north.
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Caravans Heading North, Central Australia © Spaswinefood
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You will soon discover that distance from one town to another in the Australian outback is always great. We arrived in Alice Springs two days after leaving Katherine. We took our time and made overnight stops at Mataranka (Mataranka Homestead Caravan Park) and Ti Tree (Ti Tree Roadhouse Caravan Park). I still remember that restful night at Ti Tree, watching the sunset. These two nights on the road, as we headed to Centre of Australia, the temperature dropped at night. We needed a duvet to keep warm.
During our travels from Katherine to Alice we stopped at many pubs along the way. If you have not heard of Central Australia's pubs then you are really missing out. In a future post I will write about the pubs of Central Australia.
Crossing the Tropic of Capricorn and Onwards to Alice
That day we ate lunch at the Botanical Garden of the Olive Pink Botanical Park.
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| Olive Pink Botanical Park, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
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| The Bean Tree Cafe, Olive Pink Botanic Garden © Spaswinefood |
It was a pleasant day and an enjoyable lunch.
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| The Bean Tree Cafe © Spaswinefood |
The park is named after Olive Muriel Pink, or Miss Pink as she was known. Miss Pink was an advocate for aboriginal people. She also had a botanical interest in the Alice Springs area.
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| Olive Pink Botanical Park © Spaswinefood |
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| Olive Pink Botanical Park, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
It was near perfect temperature the day we visited the park.
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| Sculpture, Olive Pink Botanical Park © Spaswinefood |
Alice Springs Desert Park
After lunch we visited the Alice Springs Desert Park. This park is located outside town, with a beautiful view of the nearby mountains.
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| Alice Springs Desert Park, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
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View of Mountains, Alice Springs Desert Park © Spaswinefood
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Alice Springs Desert Park we viewed some examples of vegetation typical of Central Australia.
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| Central Australia Vegetation, Desert Park © Spaswinefood |
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| Desert Park Vegetation © Spaswinefood |
At the park you can also view animals that a typical of this region. I never tired of seeing the kangaroos wherever we travelled in Australia.
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| Kangaroos, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
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| Dingo, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
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| Dingos, Central Australia © Spaswinefood |
This was one of the few places we saw dingos. It was indeed a special treat to see the dingos. During our three months traveling in Australia, mostly in the outback, we only saw one dingo in the wild.
When it started to rain we had already begun a walk with the park ranger.
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| Walk with Ranger, Desert Park © Spaswinefood |
The rains continued, resulting in the cancellation of afternoon walking tours and the bird show. Even though it was raining heavily we decided to visit the nocturnal animals housed at a facility in the park. I am glad we did because we were able to see desert nocturnal animals, which we would not otherwise have seen. Here are some of the nocturnal animals that I managed to photograph:
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| Quoll, Desert Park © Spaswinefood |
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| Thorny Devil, Desert Park © Spaswinefood |
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| Thorny Devils, Desert Park © Spaswinefood |
Later, we returned to our campsite for the evening. It rained most of the evening. No one complains about rain in the desert. Rains are always
appreciated in a desert environment. We awoke the next morning to rain soaked ground and moist clouds
hanging low over the MacDonnell Range. There were amazing desert smells in the air, as we set off to explore the West MacDonnell National Park (see post). After touring the West MacDonnell National Park we return to Alice Springs Desert Park for the bird show.
Bright and early the next morning we were off to visit the red rock. Yes, that famous red rock. Everyone thinks it is close, but it is actually 450 km away. This makes it a good day's drive and so we needed to get an early start. It was foggy at
the start of our 450 km journey. We made a quick stop at the Big M to pickup coffee
before leaving Alice. There is so much to do and see in the Central Australia region of Australia's Northern Territory. I invite you to join me in my travels in Australia and elsewhere at Spaswinefood.
Sharon
June 2015
Alice Springs
Northern Territory,
Australia
© Spaswinefood
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Red Centre Way, Central Australia © Spaswinefood
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