Sunday 05 June 2022
Finke River Camp to Ormiston Gorge – Section 10
Distance 8.82km
Moving time 2:19
Track time 2:46
Temp 10′- 22′

We had an easy day today. We tried to set out early but only managed 9:50. We will try again tomorrow. The hike was only up 168m down 139m over 8.9km. So a short day. It was picturesque. The scenery changed often and was quite beautiful most of the walk. The up was steep but only for a short distance to another Hilltop Lookout. We arrived at Ormiston Gorge about lunch time. David was quite happy with that as his legs are a little tired today, he didn’t even want to do the extra walk, he said we can do the extra when we come back to collect our food boxes. He is also happy with the extended schedule we have set as he now thinks the 12 days he thought we could do is definitely unrealistic. He wanted to rest. So we had a cafe lunch which was really weird. Way too many people and it just didn’t feel right. We also got a bonus hot shower. We enjoyed a lovely walk to Ormiston Gorge at twilight. It is very beautiful. We got our new supply of food from our drop boxes with our special treats for today. Coke, gatorade, aero chocolate and peaches for breaky besides the daily food rations for the next 3 days. And we saw our first mice so we hung our food and water bladders from the rafters on fishing line again tonight.
We have a big day tomorrow as we have to carry 2 days water so 4 litres for me and 5 litres for DB and climb 562m up. Eek!

Saturday 04 June 2022
Rocky Bar Gap to Finke River camp
Section 11 Part 2
Distance 16.43km
Moving time 4:30
Track time 6:05
Temp 6′- 23′
Well last night was a big learning curve. We set the poles at 120, 120, 105. It was very snug but gave us a large footprint. Downside was the ceiling was too low and every time I rolled over which was often, my sleeping bag gathered some of the condensation as it rubbed against the ceiling. Result. Very wet sleeping bag. We slept quite well for a first night and so just a few teething issues to iron out. Apparently this is the first night of really heavy dew in weeks because of the water in the ground from the rain. Anyway we will learn as we go.
We finally set off at 10.10am after mucking around for ages, with wet tent and sleeping bag and DB being his usual social butterfly. It was a tough gig this morning after a short walk through varied terrain at the 3km mark we went up 300m in elevation over 2km. Half way up I had my first moment, just trying to hard to go fast, once I slowed my pace down I was ok. It took about 2 hours to do the first 5 km but at 1015m elevation we had the most amazing view at Hilltop Lookout. We enjoyed a lovely hour or so having lunch and thankfully don’t my sleeping bag. Mt Sonder looked amazing is the background.
We got going again at about 1.15pm for the remaining 10 km. The first 3km took about an hour and we descended over 400m. The remaining 7km we paced our out doing about 15min kms until we can to the Davenport creek crossing. Time to take off our shoes and wage across. Luckily it was only one deep. Boy was it nice to get your feet wet in the icy cold water. We finally reached Finke River camp at 4.30 after avoiding 2 more Creek crossings by walking up stream 100m both times. Then she soon as we were just shy of the camp the river we avoided beckoned me for a swim. It was icy cold and I had to be quick so I could be dry and dressed before the sun went down. We decided to sleep in the river bed as the camp sites left were really rocky.
We enjoyed a social dinner with a couple from Tassie near Stanley and a young couple from Melbourne. After dinner, doing our dinner, hanging out food bags, we headed to bed at about 8.40pm. The sunset and stars were amazing tonight. Hopefully the tent goes a little better tonight. We set the poles at 120, 120, 120, fingers crossed for a drier night.

Friday 03 June 2022
Redbank Gorge to Rocky Bar Gap – Section 11 Part 1
Distance 12km
Moving time 3hrs 1mins
Track time 4hrs 11mins
Max temp 19-20′

“The 230km long Larapinta Trail is one of Australia’s most spectacular bushwalking and trekking experiences. It is also one Australia’s newest trails and is quickly emerging as one of the
most popular trails in Australia and the world. The trail ranges from grade 3 – moderate, to grade 4 – moderate to difficult and 5 – difficult. You should allow 20 days for this remote and difficult walk, taking into account rest stops, side trips and time to restock food supplies.”

We started out early this morning. Up at 6.15 am and ready and waiting for our transport at the caravan park entrance at 7.40 am. Pick was for 7.45 but they arrived about 8.
We had a lovely chat with Penny and Eric from Manly who are also doing west to east. They will start with Mt Sonder today and will probably catch us along the way over the next few days.
There were so many people at Redbank Gorge. Day trippers, people who had finished the end to end from the east (one last east in her mid 70s and had completed the full trail), and people who do the highlight your of the trail. Walking about 8 days in the most picturesque sections. Some of these are probably the toughest as well but they only have a day pack. As always David spent many minutes talking to the people who were finished. Some of them had already done Mt Sonder this morning for sunrise and they were back down by 10am. Unfortunately no sunrise but a lovely walk back down all the same. You will not believe it but we saw Liza from the Surf Club at Avoca and Jodi who is Lisa Swan’s cousin. They were doing the highlight package.
It was a lovely first day walk. My pack weighing in at 12kg and David’s is 13.
We talked to many people until we passed the Redbank Summit trail turn off and then we only crossed paths with one other girl who was heading west on her 2nd last day. More notes taken and while we were standing there she notice about a 3m snake, DB thinks a python of some kind, but as yet to be identified. Stay posted. From then on we didn’t see anyone else until we got to camp. We walked through picturesque countryside and as the day progressed the slight sprinkling rain we drove through stopped, the clouds parted and we ended up with blue skies. Besides the snake we only saw a few birds but it is amazing how green the countryside is. We said goodbye to Mt Sonder after about 6km. We had lunch in a lovely spot looking out over the range at about the 6.5km mark. The morning had gone very well but after lunch we both had sore shoulders so we are very grateful to only be doing a short day today. So we stopped at 2.30pm and set up our new tent, dried my socks, bra and long sleeve shirt on a tree, had a wash. It is amazing how long this takes. David sourced some ideas for protecting food from the mice, shoes from the dingoes and general track information. He really is a social butterfly. Our new water filters and bags are awesome. We treated 5 litres of water from the tanks with minimum effort. It started getting cool at about 5pm and I had most of my clothes on. Skins, 200 thermals, my hiking pants and clean socks on the bottom half and 200 thermal top, 150 t-shirt, polar fleece and puffer. We had an early dinner at 5pm and I am in bed snug as a bug in a rug at 5.48. I have managed to remove a couple of layers – hiking pants and puffer jacket. Let’s see how our first night in our squibby new 2 person Zpack duplex tent goes. I think we are going to be ok. Night night. Xx

Thursday 2nd June 2022
We have had another hectic day of organisation.

Firstly a quick check that all the boxes are sorted, then I needed to pack my backpack so I could relax because as per usual I am a little edgy and stressed with the new challenge we are undertaking. I know that once I am packed I will be OK and will settle down.

A quick trip to Alice Springs for a couple of things we forgot, a takeaway lunch and then we have to drive the 30km to drop off our food boxes at Ormiston Gorge, Serpentine Gorge and Standley Chasm. It was great to drop them ourselves as this meant we would know where they are when we are walking. Also it gave us the chance to make some last minute changes.

We finally got home about 6pm. Now I thought whilst I was packing my backpack this morning David was doing the same thing but he was just trialling different ways to pack, so whilst I got dinner he did his backpack. Then after dinner we still had to pack up the gazebo and all our other stuff so we are ready to go by 7.15am in the morning. We have been very lucky that we can leave our car here for $30 and the driver is picking us up at the front gate in the morning. 

Well we were finally organised at 9pm. Wish us luck. I am really looking forward to the hike and am feeling quite relaxed about it now that I am ready. We will be uncontactable for about 17 days. Kristen can contact us if necessary. Take care everyone and I will blog when we get back. xxx

Wednesday 1st June 2022
Boy did it rain last night and unfortunately it continued throughout the day making it very difficult to get organised. I spent the morning packing my snack pack which includes nuts, M&Ms and sultanas and then my daily food parcels. Cereal pack, Wrap for lunch, Freeze dried dinner, chips, snack pack and snickers x 17 a very arduous task. Especially in the rain, thank goodness for the gazebo, but it was very cold working outside as it was only 10°. Then I organised David’s breakfast pack x 17.

We then headed after lunch to pick up the things I was short off, the other things we didn’t manage to get and the storage boxes. We finally got back to camp at 5pm and the rain was still coming down. After dinner David then had to organise his 17 days food packs. We are all packed into our 3 food drop boxes. We have one section where we have to carry 7 days food, for me this is 525g per day. So over 3.5kg of food at the start of this section. This is on day 7 so hopefully I am more conditioned by then. Day 1 we have three days food and day 4 we have three days food. So we will be easing in to the weight. On day 13 we have 4 days food. Luckily if we realised we have too much of anything we can leave it in the food boxes at the different food drops as we have to collect them after the walk.

Well I am totally shattered now, so off to bed for me. We still have to deliver the boxes over 150km tomorrow and pack our backpacks.

Tuesday 31st May 2022
Today was a day of organising and planning. We booked our transfer for the Larapinta Trail to start on Friday morning. It was a little tricky as our Caravan Park is outside the pickup zone, do we get a taxi to centre early in the morning, stay in a hotel the night before we start or another caravan park closer. It became very difficult as the Finke Race is on starting 5th June so Alice is totally booked out. No cabins, hotel rooms, caravan parksites. We were lucky we managed this one.

We have lucked in, our transfer guy has said he will pick us up from outside our caravan park on Friday morning 7.45am. That has made it a lot easier for us.

I spent the morning packaging my breakfast for our 17 day hike. That’s 17 packs of cereal, sultanas, almonds and powdered milk. Weighing each ingredient to ensure the weight stays down, Very time consuming. Then we went into Alice to organise the key for food drop lockers, bought some more freeze dried food and groceries. It is really hard to make sure you have everything you need to pack your daily food needs. It is list after list after list.

We ran out of time to go to Bunnings and Desert Dwellers so that is now on tomorrows list of things to do. We managed to do the groceries quite late and hen had a lovely dinner at a sushi train.

Monday 30th May 2022
We had a lovely day today.

Firstly we enjoyed a beautiful morning at our campsite talking to Trish and Steve, a couple of travellers. Steve an indigenous guy a bit older than us and his wife Trish from Mareeba QLD. We traded stories and chatted for ages and before we knew it the time was already 10.30am. Steve was really impressed that I always try to use indigenous names I’m my blog and said it is great to see people making an effort even if I pronounce them all wrong. At least we try. We packed up and headed down to the Redbank Gorge trail and saw some people who had just finished the full Larapinta trail so we spent the next 30mins chatting to them and gleaning information, do’s and don’ts, etc. It was very beneficial. 

We then headed to the gorge walk which was up the riverbed to a beautiful gorge. We enjoyed another chat to some people who were here for the Finke dirt race which starts here about 5th June. So looks like accommodations might be a problem. Only time will tell. 

We then headed back and whilst preparing for lunch we met another couple who had just finished the trail. We chatted again some more. We finally headed on our way to Alice Springs at about 1.30pm. We stopped the Mt Sonder Lookout to take a photo of our climb and decided we should maybe check out accommodation. Availability.  We were hoping to get a cabin so David could do some work and we could prepare for the hike. The weather is supposed to be rainy on Wednesday. There was not a cabin to be had, nor a cheap motel on booking.com, nor anything on Airbnb. So it looks like a campsite in a caravan park. We just managed to get a site at Temple Bar Caravan park a little bit out of town. We tried to stay here in 2018 as it has grassy sites and comes highly recommended on WikiCamps. 

The drive to Alice Springs was along Larapinta Drive which is where we will be hiking in the ranges, the view was spectacular yet again. Unfortunately I had a little snooze along the way and missed some, but will get it at a lower speed over the next couple of weeks as we hike the range.

We will hopefully make a decision as to a start date for the hike tomorrow and do some more planning. We are feeling more confident about the hike after our training hikes over the last 2 weeks. Out fitness has improved and our bodies are holding up pretty well. David’s shin splints seem to be ok today. 

Sunday 29th May 2022
Well we have had an epic day today. 

We had a lovely morning at Kings Canyon, but I am in trouble again. I had a big snoring night so DB got no sleep again. Oops!

We headed off on our way about 10am headed for Redbank Gorge. We were taking the Mereenie Rd which goes through Aboriginal Land so it has a $6.50 fee. It is a 200km or so dirt road which was graded about 2 weeks ago. Unfortunately it was already corrugated but not too bad. The scenery was amazing, the hills and plains were spectacular. On the way to Redbank Gorge we stopped at Gosse Bluff which was created by a comet which arrived 142 million years ago. Then we headed on to Redbank Gorge.

Larapinta Trail – Tjoritja Ranges – Alice Springs – Day 1
Sunday 29th May 2022
Redbank to Mt Sonder return – Section 12
Distance 15.1km
Moving time 4:04
Track time 4:44
Up 723m Down 716m

We were unable to book a campsite for tonight this morning so at 3pm we decided to walk to the Mt Sonter saddle to make a call to the NT National Parks office. Unfortunately when we got to the saddle there was no phone reception so we couldn’t book. Oh well, we decided to continue on to the Mt Sonter Summit as we were already a third of the way there. It was a big walk, 16km return with an elevation climb of over 750m with only 3 hours of daylight. The views were fantastic along the way but it was a shame it wasn’t sunny as it would have been even better. This walk is the 12th section of the Larapinta Trail which we hope to walk in a few days time. We paced it out up the challenging climb and made it in record time arriving at 5.23pm. Pretty good effort for 8km and 750m elevation climb. We hung around at the summit for about 20 mins but the wind was howling and we needed to make tracks so we made the most of the little light left today, sunset is 6pm so we will be trekking the rest in the dark. As always our had torches are in the backpack. So off we went, we paced it out again and the light lasted until about 6.20pm and then it was walk by torchlight. We kept up a good pace and got back to the car by 7.43pm. It was a shame we didn’t get to enjoy the view on the way down but maybe next time. We did get sunset so we were happy with that.

We headed to the campsite and had our first easy dinner as we were both pretty tired. Fried egg wraps. It was a fantastic but exhausting day.

Saturday 28th May 2022
Sorry for the delay in updates we have had no wifi for a few days.

After sharing more stories with our Tassie neighbours this morning, we headed to Kings Canyon to do the Scenic Rim walk. This was a 6km loop walk up to the rim of Kings Canyon and then a loop around the top. It was very like the Kimberleys WA and also some of the rocks looked like Purnululu (The Bungles) on a smaller scale. Again there wasn’t much birdlife or animals today but the views were amazing yet again. After the rim walk we then did the 2km return River Creek walk in to the Canyon. We took it pretty easy today, we only did about 10km with all the extra lookouts and gorges in about 4 hours. So a very leisurely pace. 

We then headed to Kathleen Springs but decided not to walk anymore. It was another 2km return gorge walk and instead we headed back to camp for a rest. Very unusual for us.

We enjoyed the sunset over the Canyon whilst we ate an early dinner. It was a lovely day.

We have seen a few dingoes walking around camp tonight and I just heard one howling.

Friday 27th May 2022
Well my cold led to a very sleepless night for David, I apparently snored all night, so our plan to go to the Rock for sunrise was squashed. Instead I headed out on my own for a walk to Uluru lookout which was a 1.3km walk from the campground and left David to get some sleep.

It was dark at 6.15am as I left but the sky was amazing. I wished I had got up a little earlier but it is what it is. It was a lovely walk and the sky was so good. When I reached the lookout I was the only one there and the view of Uluru in the dawn light was magical. Yet again I am in awe of its splendour. After being mesmerised for a while I decided to do some yoga. Part way through in the middle of a pose I notice you could also see Kata Tjuta from there as well. It was a lot further away but was still magical. Is I enjoyed some more time watching the beautiful view.

My solitude was only interrupted momentarily by one runner tourist on his daily exercise run, apart from that I had it all to myself. At about 8.15am I decided I should probably head back to camp for breakfast as we are checking out of here today.

We left at about 2pm and had a lovely drive from Uluru to Kings Canyon. The vegetation was changeable and the views were lovely. The odd mountain popped up and the the beautiful Kings Canyon was in sunset glow as we arrived. 

Yet again, the campground was at capacity and we were lucky to find a spot. We popped in between a couple from Narara and Hobart. We chatted for a little while with our Central Coast locals and then for a very long time with our Tassie neighbours. They were our age and also avid hikers. It was their maiden voyage with a rooftop tent and they were keen for all the tips, from cookers to blogging. We enjoyed a lovely night of travel stories from both of us.