Do you think the rock is just a rock?? I did! I was about as keen to go to the rock as a kid is to go to school for the first day. I through a paddy, thought I would be bored s***less and it would be a waste of money. However I have always been a true believer you can't judge if your don't try and I like to make my own judgment for myself. Turns out I am also good at admitting when I am wrong!

At the end of the day, yea the rock is still a rock and no one can say otherwise. However, the size of it was so long it can't be measured (the part we see is less than a 5th of whats below the surface.) It really is in the middle of nowhere but there were a few other smaller rocks, hills and canyons dotted around the outback and the colour change at night was kinda cool, but the reason it was worth the whole day of traveling, $1000 and ear chewing from Becki was the stories and spiritualism it brought!

Sadly Shereen had to travel back to Brisbane for an extra weeks work (although that's a whole other story) so it was going to be a different trio; Becki, Rachel and me. To make the rock a bit more exciting Becki had bribed me with a road trip back via Adelaide and back to Melbourne and me being me wanted to play the gamble. We had been watching out for a relocate camper van from Alice Springs to Adelaide but with the miss haps of Sydney we didn't want to take that much of a risk as time wasn't on our side. So we met Rachel in Southern Cross Station on Thursday afternoon to board our flight. In true Rachel style it wasn't that easy, She had lost her passport, forgotten to pack any underwear or walking shoes. So we made a quick pit stop to the DFO's to grab what we thought were essentials and crossed our fingers that a UK driving license would be enough to board the flight.

We caught the Skybus to the airport all extremely excited, so much so I think we had to remind ourselves to breath. Check in went well, it was time to tell if the driving license would work, no wait Rachel had to pass boarder control. She lost everything, including her razor, tweezers, fancy shampoo and deodorant, just to breeze through passport control and have to re buy all the stuff she lost! The flight went so fast (even though it was two and a half hours long, shows the size of Australia) as we all caught up with the gossip of the last six weeks. Again bless little Rachel, she had left us in Brisbane to go fruit picking for her second year visa, after two hours she slipped cutting the grapes, cut her index finger to the bone and had to be rushed to hospital (without travel insurance or Medicare.) That ended her fruit picking time so she went on to work again in insurance but in Melbourne.

We landed safely on the red sands of Alice Springs, to be greeted by an extremely outback looking girl, who's hat was the classic brimmed hat, double upped shirts, tight jeans, big belt and cowboy boots. We all stopped in our steps and starred as she shouted across the small toy like airport "alright mate, got the BBQ going?" At that point we all know the home comforts of Brissy and Melbourne were long gone, we had to toughen up and get involved.

Our bus driver was full of beans, relaying all the do's and don'ts of the outback. I think it was just a scare tactic but believe me it worked. We even considered applying sunscreen at 8.30 at night after we heard how the sun gives you 3 degree burns, Our shoes were religiously checked morning and night for illegal immigrants in the form of scorpions and spiders and after dark we didn't leave our room unless we were in a taxi. All that aside everyone had smiles on their faces and a twinkle in their eye. We were all going of the beaten track as not many backpackers come up this far due to time and money restraints.

We checked into our rooms, dumped our bags, put on a jacket and headed to the bar. The night was getting better and better, 7 dollar jugs of beer, we were used to paying at least 15! The next choice we had to make (yes this is how hard our life is) what to eat; croc burgers, roo chilli or bangers and mash? After a good feed and a few jugs we headed for bed as we had an early start.

4.am went and passed and Rachel had missed her alarm, luckily 5 am hit and Becki had set a back up alarm! We finally managed to break Rachael's snoring pattern, watched her freak out for a bit as she couldn't shower, checked out of our room and tried to eat breakfast. Sadly cold coffee and damp white bread with jelly wasn't what anyone wanted first thing in the morning, so we left that on the side and headed to our bus, and met Mark.

Everyone piled into the bus, found some spare seats and feel straight back to sleep. After about an hour or so on the road we stopped at our first service centre. It looked like it had come straight from Hollywood from a horror film. It was a Shell gas station, with the old style pumps, and there was us and a few utes lined up to get our tanks ready for our onwards journey. We had a quick pee in the spider filled bug ridden toilets, got some snacks and we were off again. This time we weren't allowed to sleep, Mark explained what we had in store, where we were going and what we needed to think about. We made a quick stop at 'Foululuru', it got me (I thought it was Uluru!), I saw it and wanted to head home. The rock was in the distance, in the middle of nowhere and was red, it could have got anyone. We took a few photos but were more interested in taking jumping photos on the road that never ended. Ironically we hadn't seen any cars the whole time we had been there, as soon as we tried to take a photo two cars came zooming past. Luckily it wasn't long before the coast was clear, we got our first of many jumping photos and headed up the small sand dune to see the salt flats.

This time on the bus Mark did what everyone hates but knew was coming, ice breakers. We had to take it in turns to come to the front of the bus, sit next to the gear box and say our name, nationality, an interesting fact about us, what super power we wanted, what animal we would like to be and our first and last kiss. There was 21 of us, so this took some time and everyone looked as nervous as each other and all hated our first and last kiss question as Mark always knew what to say to embarrass you.

Our next stop was of great importance, beer stop! Everyone ordered between 5-10 cans, no with a Northern Monkey and fish Becki in my circle of friends we topped everyone and ordered 20 each! After placing the order we did the maths and worked out it would be 50 dollars each, I was told that it would be money well spent. At first we thought Christmas had come early as the Chinese guy typed 1.50 dollar into eftpos machine but luck wasn't on our side and on our way back they stopped us and made us pay the whole balance... gerrrrrrrrr!

After another few hours on the bus we arrived at Kata Tjuta. Kata Tjuta were also know as the Olgas, a group of boulders in the middle of the desert. They were made up of a red stone with a strong iron concentration and as a result we had to cross our fingers that we would be able to do the whole walk. Luckily for us the temperature was a mere 32 degrees, if it had been over 35 in the shade the walk would have been off. This was due to the huge iron concentration at certain parts of the walk we had to hike between two Olgas and it would be 50+ so the level of heat stroke would be too high.

The walk was really nice as Mark got back to nature with some sticks, sand and stones to use as his chalkboard. He explained that the rocks were made up hundreds of years ago, small sand like stones lay flat on the bottom of the earth. Then overtime bigger rocks built up and then some smaller rocks lay flat on top. The pressure of the large rocks was so intense that over time they all fussed together and formed the massive Olgas we see today.

Also during the walk we saw some cool trees, one gave a natural bug spray (which Becki and Rachel covered themselves in due to the ridiculous number of flies) We also saw an antiseptic bush, which if you placed the pines around a wart would get rid of it. We continued along the walk to find a massive opening in the rocks where we could see for miles a mixture of desert and small rocks and trees. We had a quick biscuit and sat around ready to hear our next story.

I am sure you have all seen a picture of a native Aboriginal, they have finger paint marks on their body in four colour's. The paint came from the Olga's, we used a bit of water to get the colours, but the natives used kangaroo fat. Back in the day tribes would used their Olga colour's as a trading tool with other tribes. The walk back to the bus was done at a bit of a pace as we didn't want to miss our first official sighting of Uluru with its sunset.

The sunset was nice, but it actually happened in the west so not over Uluru, but we did watch the coluor's change in the rock, while having a beer and some dinner. We were the last bus to leave as we had a plan..... we were going to do a drive by on another rival group. We had a practice run and the went straight into "We are the champions" at the top of our voice, circling the other group. We left them in disarray with our war cry on 'BEER' and lots of giggles.

We arrived at our campsite, got showered and sat around listening to Marks stories from back home and looking at his pictures. The man had lived the life! He was a pro mountain bike rider, he lived in a tent for 3 years to save a deposit for a house and managed to get into Oxford Uni without any qualification, just on confidence and self belief alone. The man was an inspiration and made both Becki and I realise we need a life plan if we want to successful.

We called it a night, and got into our swags. A swag is a waterproof liner, with a small mattress inside, where you put your sleeping bag inside, yup no tent or roof for us! We looked up and we were all speechless. Everywhere you looked there was a star, twinkling really brightly. We could see the Southern Cross, Arion's belt and the big dipper. We all soon fell asleep off to the land of nod.

Day two started with an early wake up call, we packed up our swags, brushed our teeth and jumped into the van. We all piled out in Marks special location. The sun was just about to come up, we all drank our coffee, eating our toast and watching in amazing as the sun rose from behind Uluru and woke up Australia. The rock looked incredible, but its beauty was soon over ruled by the flies. They were everywhere I had at least two swimming around in my tea and lots more buzzing in my ear. Not to mention how many I ate while I ate my toast.

We headed to the culture centre, where we were left to our own to read all about what we were about to see and the stories behind each part of the rock. There was lots of info, but each sign ended with "Don't climb the rock!" One thing I did remember was that lots of photos were covered up with a sign saying that the persons identity must be covered as they are deceased. We then went for a small 1 Km walk where Mark told us some more stories and gave us a little bit more info about the rock. Luckily due to strong winds the climb was closed but I think after hearing all the stories no one would have climbed it anyway. Mark put it like 'you wouldnt go into a Temple in your bikini?, so why would you go against the Aboriginals beliefs?'

We where then left with a map and told to walk the rest of the base..... that's when the boredom and resentment started to set in. It was hot, stuffy and loads of flies. It was amazing how uninteresting the rock became to everyone once the stories and signs had stopped. After about an hour and a half we were at the car park, ready to eat. We all ate as much food as the flies would let us and got back onto the bus to go fire wood hunting.

We had a huge drive, then we pulled over the side of the road by some dead trees. We all hoped out, ready to get stuck in and went on a hunt. We had strict instructions on size, length and thickness. After we had gathered enough and loaded the bus we were back on the road again.

One last stop before camp, wiggery grub hunting. We all watched Mark on what we were looking for. We had to find smallish trees with roots near the surface, dig deep and tap the roots to see if they are hollow. As a group we dung up about 10 trees without any luck. We all got back onto the bus a little disoriented. We did the standard head count and one person was missing. We saw him coming out of the bushes, covered in mud holding a shovel wearing a big grin. In his other hand he had a small white grub wriggling around. He asked if anyone wanted to share and I piped up. I wasn't going to miss out on my chance to be like a Celebrity get me out of here.

Jeff bit into our poor little fella, taking his life and spilling his guts everywhere. He had a few facebook photo shots and pass the remaining half to me. I did the same, had a few snaps taken and prayed to God I wouldn't be on the toilet for the next week and took a deep breath and placed the grub and its guts on my tongue and swollen it down whole. Yum yum tastes like chicken. Well maybe not but it wasn't too bad and I didn't have to make a quick dash to the loo.

We had a quick drive back to camp, unloaded our stuff, helped with cooking and ate a feast. After dinner the drinks started to go down well and we went for a walk to the middle of an open grass area to look at the stars. There was a group of about 5 or 6 of us, all sharing our knowledge of stars and the atmosphere. Again Mark left us all with something to ponder over as we lay in our swags that night.

This night I didn't go to sleep quite as easily as the previously, every time I tried to settle down I heard a noise and was sure there was something in my swag. I managed to convince myself so much I made Becki swop with me. After about an hour I had tired myself out so much I fell asleep. We later found out that another girl had swapped swags and one poor girl hadn't slept either night as she was too scared. When we later got back to Alice we heard that some groups had mice running all over their swags and face, I wouldn't have slept with that. Where there are mice there will be snakes to eat mice!

Day three started a little later than Mark had planned as he slept in, but we were still all eating brekkie at 6am. We had a lot of driving ahead of us today. Not too long into the drive we stopped at Kings canyon . Some bright spark tried to compared Kings canyon with the Grand canyon , when Mark pointed out that the Grand canyon is actually a gorge as it was created by a river.

King's canyon looked very cool, but all those who know what a canyon is, you would know you would have to climb to the top to really appreciate it! So we did, it was horrific! Luckily it was only about 8.30 in the morning so the sun wasn't fully showing his face, but still the sweat kept dripping off us. It was touch and go if Rachel would make it up there, but after cursing us the whole way and refusing to move any further at some points we all made it to the top to admire the view.

We could see for miles (not that there was much to see!) but it did look super cool. Health and Safety geek Rachel wouldn't go to the edge and if Becki and I we were to go any closer than 2 meters towards the edge she would shout at us! After a few trips to the edge mother Grimshaw relaxed and had a quick snap with us on the edge, we even got her to jump.

We heard a few more stories and saw a few more plants and rock formations during our hike. We then followed a boardwalk down to a small water hole called the Garden of Eden. At the start of the day we were all adamant that we weren't going in, but it didn't take long for our clothes to be on the floor, our bathers on and us splashing around. It did take some a little longer than others and Rachel wanted at least one of us but preferably both of us by her side. She was even less impressed when we said we wanted to take a group photo in the pools, there was no prying her off us.

After a quick snack we were off again, back up the inside of the canyon and had another little walk around. We headed back to the bus and got ready for our long trip back. After stopping for a quick pee and getting stung for the $148.50 we owed for the drinks we drove a few more hundred kilometer's the first gas station on day one. We stocked up on chocolate, had lunch, quickly reorganised the bus due to the rain and were on our way again.

We had one final stop at a camel farm, where Becki had a ride on one of the water hoarders. She was thrown all over the place and after it starting to jog, it made certain she can never have kids. The stop was quick but we saw the cutest husky dog ever!

We soon arrived back to Alice, where we were dropped off first with all our luggage (well so we thought.) After reading this blog can you guess who lost their bag???? Yes Rachel some how left her whole bag on the bus, so we frantically searched for Marks number, luckily another tour guide showed up to drop his group off and we manged to reach Mark to come back. Within a few minutes Mark and the bus were back but no bag. Becki had gone back to the room and I had stayed with Rachel but stupidly let her check herself!

Mark said he would check the bus when everyone got out and we should call in about half an hour. Poor Rachel didn't know what to do with herself, luckily she had her handbag with her important documents and a huge grate of beer!! The lost bag just had clothes. We had a group dinner which we need to get ready for so we had to find Rachel an outfit from mine and Becki's clothes, which aren't quite what Rachel is use to wearing. After a few mishaps and a lot of beer to calm Rachel, Rachel settled in my dress and we were off to dinner.

Dinner was ok, we were all worrying about Rachels bag as we couldn't get hold of Mark and then half way through dinner he came over just chatting to us about our meal with Rachels bag on his back! It was under her seat the whole time! Still to this day she swears she checked it and that Mark had stolen her bag, tried on her clothes, realised they didn't fit and gave it back! The rest of the night was ok, we just all chatted but we had a fairly early night and headed home. When we arrived back our room mates were up discussing politics and Rachel and Becki being a little drunk entertained us all with their topics of conversation. After a few hours we all fell asleep with good memories of Uluru!

I think everyone should make the effort but remember DON'T CLIMB IT!!!!!!!