DAY ONE
After an amazing night sleeping in a bed again, the alarm goes off at 5.20am(!!!) for the next trip. The hostel provides free breakfast from 5-9am. There's bread, tea and coffee, but I'm still in the 'one eye open' phase so I sit and wait on the pick up.

We get picked up by our guide GeaJay at 5.50am and a group of 22 board the little bus. At present I'm not feeling it due to looking like I've done 22 rounds with Tyson (mosquito bitten face and eye aaaahhhhh) but on the way to the first stop GeaJay has everyone introduce themselves, tell everyone what was the first CD we bought (Due to being old and having a memory destroyed by alcohol, I've no idea so I go with Spice Girls. I later think it might have been Take That? Christ....), then the most recent (Tomorrowland album yeaaaaaah!) and then gets us to draw on our window with chalk pens. It's safe to say after re-living the childhood taste in music and graffitiing, I'm in much better spirits!

Our first stop is at a Camel Farm. $7 for a shot on a camel and it walks half way round a track then runs the rest haha. I didn't do it but had a great time watching the others who did, whilst eating the biggest Anzac biscuit I've ever seen in my whole life haha.
We then stop just up the road at a sort of lookout point that allows you to see Mount Connor and some of the red centre in the distance. You can't get any closer than 5km to Mount Connor as tourists camping there in the early 90s decided to climb the mountain drunk and destroyed a memorial that turned out to have the owners wives ashes inside.... Now it's completely closed and classed as private land.

We pick up our last member of the group from Ayers Rock airport and head to Yulara - Ayers Rock Resort. Unfortunately we are not staying in the 6 star resort.... The tours have their own sections in the camping grounds, where we stop for lunch.

On 26th of October 1985, title deeds to Uluru and Kata Tjuta were handed back to Anangu traditional owners, who then leased the land to the federal government for 99 years. Since then, Anangu have been working with the Director of National Parks to jointly manage this place. During this time, the park has been recognised as a World Heritage Area for both it's natural and cultural values. For these reasons you are asked to respect the Anangu ways and traditions; there is no photography allowed in the cultural centre or at certain points of the rock (known as 'sacred' or 'sensitive' areas).
We have already had our first sighting of Uluru (Ayers Rock) when we headed into the resort. You can see it from miles away! Uluru is 3.6km long, rises 348m above the surrounding sandy scrubland and it's believed that two thirds of the Rock lie beneath the sand. It's a brown colour in the afternoon but changes tone as the sun sets.
We head into the Cultural centre which has spiritual stories, DVDs, photographs, aboriginal art and local people doing talks to help give you a better understanding of the Anangu people.
GeaJay then starts us off on the Mala walk, which shows us rock art and tells us some history of the Anangu people, how they lived and their spiritual dealings with the rock and women/men's roles in daily life.
We head off on the base walk. This track is 10.6km and circumnavigates the rock, passing caves and paintings, sandstone folds and geological abrasions along the way. Thankfully, there's places to stop on the walk to re-fill water bottles and GeaJay meets us with cake half way round :) we stop and look at a beautiful waterhole and finally finish the walk after a good 3-3.5 hours. Due to the walk being on flat ground it was pretty easy, better when the wind was blowing and super thankful I brought my fly net - as revolting as I look, the flies aren't getting into my eyes and ears anymore - RESULT!
We then speed off to the sunset viewing area which is halfway between Yulara and Uluru - the familiar post card view of the rock. We drink champagne and watch the rock change to burnished orange shades, deeper reds then fades into a charcoal. Amazing scenes!

We head back to camp, help prepare dinner and set up our swags for the night. These swags were already better than the one I slept in at Banka Banka coming down from Darwin.... I did, however, sleep with my fly net on and my sleeping bag way over my eyes. The temperature drops at night so we were pretty cosy and sleeping under a clear sky filled with millions of stars - it takes your breath away!

DAY TWO
We are woken at 4.15am (feel like I'm back in Springsure) by GeaJay singing to us, haha. We have breakfast and leave camp at 5.15am to watch the sunrise at Kata Tjuta Dune Viewing. I can't even begin to describe to you how beautiful the view is. We are facing Uluru with Kata Tjuta (The Olga's) on our left, the sun is rising to the right of Uluru but way off in the distance. Without a doubt the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I WANT TO LIVE RIGHT HERE ON THIS DECK! The only bad point of this experience was I came dressed for summer, so I was absolutely FREEZING. GeaJay got us there sharp as well so we got there before the rest of the tour groups meaning we had the best spot.

After sunrise we head off to explore Kata Tjuta (The Olga's) a striking group of domed rocks huddled together about 35km west of the Rock. There are 36 boulders shoulder to shoulder forming deep valleys and steep sided gorges. The tallest rock - Mt Olga is approximately 200m higher than Uluru. We start the 7.4km Valley of the Winds loop walk which is like nothing I ever expected. I thought I was spending 3 days in the desert and would see nothing but sand and rock but this bush walk was beautiful. It winds through the gorges giving amazing views of the domes and the various terrains. Starting early in the morning meant we experiences the winds carried up through the valleys (living up to its name). The pictures I have taken, do not do this place justice at all. It's beautiful! We stopped at Karu lookout for cookies and took some pictures. This walk was more difficult than the base walk at Uluru due to large sloping rocks, loose rocks and all different terrains.

We headed back to camp for lunch, packed up and set of for Kings Canyon Station. We stopped at Curtin Falls where some of the group picked up a bottle of port called "it's f***ing good port" for $20 haha And I got some cider. Kings Canyon Station had a pool so we chilled there for a while, had dinner then sat around the fire listening to GeaJays stories of spooky spiritual aboriginal tales and a story about a freaky kangaroo (had us all petrified) then we lay our swags out and slept by the fire.

DAY THREE
We were once again, woken by the sound of GeaJays singing along to the Lion King Hahahaha (I don't know what it is but Disney songs keep coming up on my travels?! Especially the Lion King). We have breakfast and set off again to Kings Canyon in Watarrka National Park.
GeaJay then breaks it to us that the giant, steep, horrifying looking hill in front of us - that he has named Heart Attack Hill - is what we are climbing up to watch sunrise. Something like 400+ steps?! Fantastic, it's not like I've put on weight, become extremely more unfit than I was to start with and drank enough vodka and cider to fill Uluru over the past 8 weeks or anything, should manage this NAE BOTHER. Half way up and I genuinely thought that was how I was going to go. Heart attack. If I had a signal I would have phoned my mum crying haha. Got there in the end and of course it was worth it. We all sat on top of a rock watching the sunrise. Very cute.
After the sunrise, we were then at the start of the Kings Canyon Rim Walk which was a nifty 6km loop and would only take 4 hours.....
This walk takes you round the rim before descending down wooden stairs to The Garden of Eden - a beautiful, lush pocket of ferns, enclosed by the canyon around a tranquil pool. It was so peaceful sitting there. You head back up where you have amazing views of different rock formations and different parts of the canyon before descending back down to the bottom. This walk was quite difficult but I think maybe because it was the third day. The walk itself didn't seem to hard (except the start....) but it was definitely one of the highlights of the trip.

We head back to camp for a well deserved lunch break, then head home. GeaJay has us playing games to pass by some time and we manage to stop via the Alice Springs sign and get a group picture.

We arrive back about 4.30pm, check back into Annie's and chill until 7pm where the after party dinner and drinks begins. Annie's does amazing food, there's always a $10 cheap dinner, there's $12 jugs of beer and $5 shots.... Safe to say our night was absolute carnage! GeaJay had us playing games (one where you make specs with your fingers and make chicken noises.... Actual hilarious!). The laughs I had with Georgie, Nathan, Niamh and the two Toms.... The photos really say it all. It was like the Hangover looking at the photos after haha.

This trip was only $355 (I think I got it on offer at $325 though) which included a nights stay in the hostel. I don't know if all the tour guides are like GeaJay but we met some of them and they seemed just as fun. He definitely made our trip what it was - amazing! The red centre isn't something I thought of doing when I first arrived in Australia but it's ended up being one of my favourite tours! I have met some amazing people (albeit absolutely mental haha) that provided me with some amazing memories and brilliant laughs! For anyone who thinks it's just a rock and going to miss out.... You're off your head!

Onto the next part of the adventure...... MELBOURNE!