Follow the Journey

Hello everyone! We have just arrived in Cairns after an impecable journey through the outback with our amazing tour guide Steve that we acquired through the company Groovy Grape! Our travels began when we arrived in a quaint little town called Alice Springs. As we filled up the bus that seated twenty one, we had no idea how excited and positive Steve was about his job. Our days were filled with phrases like “Super piece of work!” and “Great job guys, excellent stuff!” when we actually just sat on the bus for five hours sleeping or reading a magazine. Our first stop after getting situated on the bus was a place called Kings Canyon where we hiked up a small canyon and sat by a watering hole for about three hours, and then spent our first night under the stars in our very own “swags” at Kings Creek Station. While some of us were in swags the very first night, others decided to ease into it by sleeping in the bus because giant beetles were flying overhead (me). But anyways, the second day we started our journey to the famous Uluru or Ayers Rock. There we learned about the Aboriginals from Steve and we got the inside scoop on the way Aboriginals were treated by Australia itself. We watched the sunset the first night and respectfully hiked around the beautiful rock the second day. A fun fact about Uluru is very much like an iceberg, two thirds of the rock itself are actually underground. The fourth day we travelled to a magnificent little place called Cooper Pedy, which is a town that was basically formed for the sake of opal mining. Not only was that exciting enough, but our accomidation for the night was inside a cave! The miners dug out perfect bunk halls to stay out of the blistering sun and sleep comfortably, so that is where we stayed for the night as well! The next morning we took a tour around some of the mining sites and browsed at some of the opals for ourselves. Later on that day we travelled to Steve’s favorite place in the outback: a random watering hole in the middle of the outback. We spent a wonderful night under the stars and sat around a campfire exchanging laughs while Katie sang beautifully in the backround. The second to last day of our travels with Groovy Grape were spent at an old hospital where we stayed a night, which was redone into a hotel (if you were concerned). We hiked to a fantastic waterfal in the middle of a mountain, and on our walk there we saw multiple kangaroos and even a kangaroo with a joey in it’s pouch! The last day of our travels with Steve were driving to Cairns where we unfortunately had to depart from our beloved Steve and begin our last leg of the journey. We all will never forget the times we spent on that bus together. Love, Avery