On Saturday we needed to catch up with shopping, etc, and spent a morning in town, trying to navigate weird one-way streets with lots of other visitors who also don't know what they are doing! All a little bit crazy in Alice on Saturday mornings! Unfortunately, Reuben also has a swollen gum we think is related to a tooth, but is not complaining of pain, and no dentists available here on weekends! Hopefully he will be pain free still on Monday.
In the afternoon, we head down to the Heritage Precinct and check out the Royal Flying Doctor Centre, which was a bit disappointing really. We had hoped to learn more about the history and use the flight simulator advertised, but neither were available! The founder of RFDS was a Reverend from Cloncurry, where Dwayne grew up, which made us even more interested, but he was hardly even mentioned. I was glad the admission fee went to the RFDS or we would have been even more disappointed.
It was good to come back to the lovely Heavitree Gap van park we are staying in, just out of town and surrounded by the gap rocks and gorgeous tall gum trees on grassy sites. Not missing the flies or red dust filling my sneakers and socks in the red centre, although I am not sure what is worse to deal with; the flies or the ignorant, rude, racist grey-nomad next door (maybe the flies) ! I am glad they are not all like him! In the evenings at dusk, we can feed the rock wallabies living on the rocks around the van park, happy to eat the grain from our hands. They are very cute!
After a chilly night, Sunday is quite mild for Alice, 21 top today. An easy morning waiting for the warmth, then my crazy Melbourne kids brave the icy, unheated pool for a quick swim before we meet up with some old friends from Melbourne in the park, who now live here. Nice to have an easy, relaxing, non-touristy day for Mothers Day.
On Monday, we welcome a return call from the dentist and Reuben is all sorted by midmorning - such a brave little man! We decide to spend the rest of the day in West McDonnell Ranges and take a look at Standley Chasm. It is most spectacular at midday, when the sun shines right down the chasm, and the 1km walk along the riverbed to get there is delightful, lush and alive, hard to believe that we are in Central Oz when here. A second walk up to the lookout is a little more testing, very steep, but with amazing views of the ranges!
On Tuesday morning, we stopped in at Many Hands Art Centre, Ngurtatjuta Iltja Ntjarra, a Fair Trade Indigenous owned cooperative, for art class. We felt so priveleged to be able to sit, watch and listen as the artists worked and told us stories about their work. Brie was especially mezmorised by the work of the artists. Linda, one of the artists is going to London next year for an exhibition of her work - the story of her life in paintings, some of which she shared with us today; which was pretty special. Some of these artists are from many miles away, while others are part of Albert Namatjiras family from just down the road at Hermannsburg, displaying their famous watercolour artwork.
From here, today we head north again up the Stuart Highway on route to Mataranka Springs and Katherine. On the road again...
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