At least 0 deg C (probably a lot
colder) - 19 (feels like 11) deg C
Drive: 86km; Total towed: 5205km
It was Greg's turn to hop out of bed and turn the heater on. We bought a Gasmate Travelmate portable heater and it has to be lit, so that's a boy’s job! When we are on a powered site, Wendy has to get out and flick the switch. Despite it feeling like we were in the antarctic, Wendy just had to answer the call of Nature. So, with six layers of clothing she ventured out. On the way back, she toured the camp and took a few photos of the sunrise. Greg decided to have his breakfast before stretching the legs.
We left Curtin Springs just before 8:30am for the very long drive of 86km. We did this to hopefully beat the check-in queue we had heard all about. We made it to Reception at the Ayers Rock Camp Ground about 9:30am (we drove quite slowly as the truck didn't warm up until we were almost here) and guess what? We were the first in the queue! Wendy was third in line at reception but the first two people were wanting to change sites (like we did at Alice Springs) but they weren't allowed to do that until 10am. So, we were able to check in, we paid and headed for the overflow camp ground which is basically a dust bowl at the back of the park, no marked sites, first in, best sited. We saw a large vacancy against the dunes on the left side of the park and as we had read the generator noise on the right side of the park was constant and loud, especially at night, we chose promptly and reversed the van in. Wendy then placed two chairs in a spot next to us for G&Y, set up the van and had mornos. G&Y arrived about 11am.
After lunch we all rode out to check out the metropolis of Ayers Rock town. Our two aims were to ride up to a lookout to catch a better glimpse of the Rock and find a place to have dinner on Wed night. Having accomplished both within 30 minutes, it was down to the serious business of an afternoon cuppa.
Gunther kindly filled our water tank whilst we charged his computer (his inverter decided to take a holiday to the tip). As the TDF was on the TV, we watched the end of that whilst Wendy made pumpkin soup. Not roasted pumpkin, but she did brown the onions and added some potato and a chicken stock cube and it smells yummy. Tastes pretty good too even though it is not yet done.
We went for a walk up to the same lookout to view Uluru at sunset - see pics. On return we had pre-dinner drinks then had our dinner.
