Friday 18th July 2014

We woke up in time for sunrise this time! Although Luca forgot his camera battery...stupid Italian! We definitely saw the colour changes of Uluru, it was fantastic! It was really breath taking! We took plenty of pictures and we stood and enjoyed the view. We are glad we went to Derek's secret location where there was no tourists, except for us!

We went to our next location, our walk at the Olgas. Seeing them yesterday they looked like giant boulders so I was very excited to see the Olgas.

The Olgas are a group of large domed rock formations or bornhardts located 25 km (16 mi) to the east from Uluru.

The 36 domes that make up Kata Tjuta cover an area of 21.68 km2 (8.37 sq mi), are composed of conglomerate, a sedimentary rock consisting of cobbles and boulders of varying rock types including granite and basalt, cemented by a matrix of sandstone.

The highest point, Mount Olga, is 1,066 m (3,497 ft) above sea level, or approximately 546 m (1,791 ft) above the surrounding plain (198 m (650 ft) higher than Uluru). Kata Tjuta is located at the eastern end of the Docker River Road.

The alternative name, The Olgas, comes from the tallest peak, Mt. Olga. At the behest of Baron Ferdinand con Mueller, Mt. Olga was named in 1872 by Ernest Giles, in honour of Queen Olga of Wuttemberg (born Grand Duchess Olga of Russia, daughter of Tsar Nicholas I).

In 15 December 1993, a dual naming policy was adopted that allowed official names consisting of both the traditional Aboriginal name and the English name. As a result, Mount Olga was renamed Mount Olga / Kata Tjuta. On 6 November 2002, following a request from the regional Tourism Association, the order of the dual names was officially reversed to Kata Tjuta / Mount Olga.

We had a fantastic walk through the Olgas, which was pretty hard at first as we were literally walking on a slanted rock face! This part is called the valley of the winds, and boy it was seriously windy! Derek told us that the spirits in the area helped clear your pains away and the winds blow them away.

We finally arrive in the open area and we continued to walk up this hill which was tough! Once we arrived to the top we looked out and it was amazing! The view resembled a heart with the valley walls and the trees below stretching out into the open is the veins. It was really a spectacular view.

We walked back to the van but not before we said goodbye to Kata Tjuta and leave all of our worries behind and boarded back on the bus.

Before we left we actually saw a dingo, a young one but it was pretty sweet to see! We all fell asleep on the way back, I didn't realise how tiring that walk was!

We came back to camp and had a shower to wake up! We had the rest of the afternoon to chill out, some of the guys went into town to use WiFi. I decided to clear up my bag and re-pack a few things! I also cleared up camp also seeing as the boys do nothing!

We had a great dinner, and stayed up to celebrate Vincent's birthday! Luca got Vincent a bucket of camel poo! Which was hilarious! Cheryl, Vincent's girlfriend brought him a big bottle of vodka, so I'm guessing what kind of night its going to be!

We moved our swags into the tent as Derek said it might rain tonight, luckily we did as it did start to rain!