Kings Canyon

Romain didn't want to drive the whole way (around 300 km) to Kings Canyon, so we stopped about 120 km before our destination at a free camping ground to stay over night. It was pretty nice place between dunes and after dinner I convinced Romain to play frisbee with me (I'm not carrying it for nothing!)!

Next morning, we arrived to Kings Canyon. It's absolutely incredible place, definitely worth visiting - it's a huge canyon in red rock, with incredible rock formations, steep cliffs and a beautiful waterhole. There are 2 walks - one short that goes at the bottom of the canyon and one a bit longer that goes around - on top of the cliffs. We walked the long one and we also went to the Garden of Eden, where we took a rest in shade, on a bank of the waterhole. We were lucky again because there were almost no people entering the waterhole at that time. Sitting on the cliff, enjoying the view over the cliffs and listening to birds - just magical!

After the walk, we had to say goodbye to each other. I wanted to continue further north to the end of West Macdonell Ranges, do some hiking on a part of Larapinta Trail and end up in Alice Springs. The problem was that the connection between Kings Canyon and the end of West Macdonell Ranges is only an unsealed road, so Romain couldn't make it with his van. So he had to drive all the way back to Stuart Highway and then up north to Alice Springs.

I was seriously thinking of staying with him because I really enjoyed his company and I also knew that it would be hard to hitch on that unsealed road. It was nearly the end of season and there were not so many cars passing through. Especially in my direction - quite a few cars were going from north to south but not that many were heading from south to north, simply because a wet season was about starting in the north (tropical) part of Australia, so it was smarter to get out of there and enjoy the summer on the south.

But I decided to risk it and stick to my original plan. However I was quite sad leaving him - he's a very interesting and unique person - smart, calm and thoughtful. It also felt somehow safe traveling with him because I didn't have to worry about transportation.

He dropped me off at a crossroads where I could get a lift to the Kings Canyon Resort - the last piece of civilization before the beginning of the unsealed outback road. I didn't have to wait too long and I got a lift to the resort from a friendly italian couple - Claudio & Antonella, enjoying their honeymoon in Australia.

It was already around 3pm but I kept on hitchin at the end of the resort. I stayed there 2,5 hours before I gave up. There was no single car passing by in my direction. I felt pretty desperate and couldn't stop thinking that I should have stayed with Romain.

I stayed in the resort camping ground for the night but I didn't really like the place. It felt remote and unfriendly and there were a couple of dingoes wandering around. I pitched my tent and started eating my sandwiches on the ground next to my tent and one of the dingoes sat down just a few metres away. Dingoes are beatiful animals (indgenous) and they're not dangerous. They have big respect to humans.

I must have looked really miserable because one of the tourists walking around, a very friendly Austrian guy, gave me two beers. It was so nice! Unfortunately, I didn't have anybody to share the beers with. But it cheered me up anyway, hehe.

I must say that dingoes are not only beautiful but also incredibly smart animals. I finished my dinner and wanted to go to a toilet. So I put all the food to my backpack, closed it and put it into my tent. But I forgot one thing - to close my tent. Oh oh, a big mistake. I went to the toilet and even though I was back after not more than 2 minutes, one of the dingoes managed to get into my tent, move the backpack, open it somehow and take the bag of bread balls that was on the top. Then I must have distracted him because he didn't steal the whole bag - he just opened it and took one bread. I was amazed! But also pissed off because the bread was incredibly expensive and I was saving it for next two days. Oh well, at the end I could do nothing but laugh about it - such a smart bastard!