Hi everyone, Well our 3rd trip started on 14th Jan and we headed off from Adelaide for Alice Springs on a 6 day tour. We hopped on our bus and met our new travelling buddies (11 of them) and our new driver Shayne. The first stop was in Parachilna, a town with a population of 5 people! The evening consisted of dinner which was a BBQ of Camel, Emu and Kangaroo. To wash it down we drank lots of wine then decided it would be a good idea to steal the towns roundabout.We finished the evening by laying money on the railway track ready for the 10.30pm train (apparently the longest train of about 160 carriages). As the train passed we all went out to try and find our money which is now very flat coins which is pretty cool! We then headed off for Rawnsley Park. On the way we stopped off to look at some caves with some aboriginal paintings. Once there we climbed the hill to watch the sunset which was pretty cool. This evening we decided to decorate the windscreen of our bus with aboriginal paintings so Julie climbed up and with her cream blusher drew some very cool pictures which in the morning Shayne had to make up a story to tell the rest of the bus! From Rawnsley Park we headed for Coober Pedy (running over and killing a Kangaroo on the way!), an opal mining town. Didn't get up to much in the day as it was a long drive and basically headed straight there but we did find time to stop to do a bit of our own opal hunting. Unfortunatley we are not rich! We had a tour of the very small town and went down one of the opal mines and had a look round an underground house. Most people in the town live underground as its much cooler and we stayed in an underground bunkhouse. From Coober Pedy we headed for Uluru (Ayres Rock) at 4.00am! We walked the base of Ayres Rock (which was 9km in about 40 degree heat!) so was very nice to sit and watch the sunset whilst drinking champagne. From Ayres Rock we headed to our campsite. We lit the camp fire and slept outside under the stars in our swags. The sky was amazing! We then arose at 4.00am again to watch the sunrise at Kata Tjata (the Olgas). This was really pretty and from here you could also see Ayres Rock in the distance. After sun rise we went on a 6km walk of the Olgas. From here we headed to Kings Canyon. After a dip in the pool by the camp site we arrived and lit the camp fire yet again. This time dinner was cooked on the fire as there was no other facilities! We tried to toast marshmallows but they we not nice as they had already melted on the bus! We then camped out again in our 50 million star accommodation! The next morning we had a lye in and got up at 5.30am. Headed to Kings Canyon. Ju did a 6km hike up the Canyon whilst Deb did a 1km walk around the base (I had blisters from walking Ayres Rock!). Tried to go on a helicopter ride over the Canyon but they were fixing it, probably a sign from heaven! Went back to the pool, had lunch and after our driver decided to shave all his hair off we headed off to Alice Springs for a well deserved drink with our new family! As the camera battery is charging we can't remember when we did some other things but we also went on a 6km walk around Rawnsley Park. The Brits did the easy walk whilst the others were feeling fitter and did the 6km hike! We also stopped off at a salt lake which was pretty cool but you can look at the pictures and see for yourselves. We head off tomorrow to Cairns and are getting ready for the beaches down the east coast. Love Deb and Ju x x