Thursday May 10th
For once a civilised hour to depart and my lovely, generous neighbour, Bev, dropped me at the airport for the flight to Alice Springs. Flying Qantas, I was able to watch War Horse which was great but it's two hours seventeen minutes long and the flight is one hour fifty five......It's the only time I have ever seen people still in their seats when the seatbelt sign went out. I think quite a few people would have quite happily sat until the end, including me! However the hotel car was waiting to take me the short distance into town. I immediately liked the hotel,
but before settling down to an afternoon by the pool I went along to the School of the Air. Established in 1951 as a distance education organisation for isolated students in the outback, it claims to have the largest classroom in the world, 521,000 square miles, which is ten times the size of England. The closest students to the Alice Springs centre are 80 kilometres away and the furthest is 1300 kms away.children may enrol at 4and a half and continue to 14 when they must then go to boarding school or follow correspondence courses. The average enrolment for the past 20 years at the Alice Springs school has been 120 pupils, mainly from cattle stations, roadhouses, national parks and military bases. The curriculum is the same as all other public (state) schools in the Northern Territory, and all students must have an identifiable home tutor who can spend a minimum of four hours per day with the student. Certainly the work on display looked familiar! (This was a quilt sewn to mark the sixtieth birthday.)
Originally broadcast by radio,
lessons are now given online and we were able to watch a lesson in progress, making fruit kebabs with Year 1! The participating pupilts all appear on the top of the screen and click a "pick me" button to interact with the teacher and other pupils. Two of the children who happened to be in town that day also took part.
I found it fascinating and it was good to hear that children educated by this method gained some of the best results in the country.
After that it was back to the pool
until the sun went down and completely changed the colours.
Friday May 11th
The tour bus arrived promptly at six fifteen, we were all handed breakfast packs and off we went towards the red centre, which because of the high rainfall over the past two years is now fairly green. We went past the dry river creek where each year they hold the Henley on Todd regatta which our guide informed us is the only regatta in the world which is cancelled if there is water in the river! The local people deck out 4x4s as boats and race them in the river bed, and there are also races where boats are carried along the creek by teams of men. As we drove we saw the sun rise and watched the blue band on the horizon gradually get bigger and bigger until it filled the whole sky.
We made out first stop at Erldunda resort where those of us going on to Kings Canyon changed buses and met our guide, Bob. ("Outback Bob") and continued on towards the Watarrka National Park. After a stop for the bush toilets (over the hill)
and a snack of fresh fruit, Bob supplemented his almost continuous commentary by showing us some of the plants and trees which play an integral part of desert life. The next stop was lunch and for this we reached Kings Canyon, and then started the trek.
The first part was all uphill and quite tough going but looking down from the rim , 270 metres
to the canyon floor, was breathtaking.
The terrain round the rim differed widely ,passing though open spaces,
squeezing between rocks, and crossing bridges
treading through grass
or leaping from rock to rock.
We passed the two gum trees which Namatjira famously painted,
and went down to The Garden Of Eden in the depths of the chasm; a permanent water hole rich in plant life including Red River Gums, Bottle Brush trees, Wattles and Figs and ferns , altogether giving it a rain forest look, indicating that this part of Australia once had a more tropical climate.
The view was constantly changing
and quite awe inspiring.
Although the walk was quite challenging we did have several stops when Bob explained either the history, geology, botany of the area or told us of the significance of each place to the Aboriginal people. It was clear that he had a real regard for the local customs and a true affinity with not only the canyon but the outback as a whole.It was a very inspiring trek, staggeringly beautiful and a truly unforgettable experience.
On the way back to the hotel we saw lots of the wild camels that are such a pest to the farmers.
but before settling down to an afternoon by the pool I went along to the School of the Air. Established in 1951 as a distance education organisation for isolated students in the outback, it claims to have the largest classroom in the world, 521,000 square miles, which is ten times the size of England. The closest students to the Alice Springs centre are 80 kilometres away and the furthest is 1300 kms away.children may enrol at 4and a half and continue to 14 when they must then go to boarding school or follow correspondence courses. The average enrolment for the past 20 years at the Alice Springs school has been 120 pupils, mainly from cattle stations, roadhouses, national parks and military bases. The curriculum is the same as all other public (state) schools in the Northern Territory, and all students must have an identifiable home tutor who can spend a minimum of four hours per day with the student. Certainly the work on display looked familiar! (This was a quilt sewn to mark the sixtieth birthday.)
Originally broadcast by radio,
lessons are now given online and we were able to watch a lesson in progress, making fruit kebabs with Year 1! The participating pupilts all appear on the top of the screen and click a "pick me" button to interact with the teacher and other pupils. Two of the children who happened to be in town that day also took part.
I found it fascinating and it was good to hear that children educated by this method gained some of the best results in the country.
After that it was back to the pool
until the sun went down and completely changed the colours.
Friday May 11th
The tour bus arrived promptly at six fifteen, we were all handed breakfast packs and off we went towards the red centre, which because of the high rainfall over the past two years is now fairly green. We went past the dry river creek where each year they hold the Henley on Todd regatta which our guide informed us is the only regatta in the world which is cancelled if there is water in the river! The local people deck out 4x4s as boats and race them in the river bed, and there are also races where boats are carried along the creek by teams of men. As we drove we saw the sun rise and watched the blue band on the horizon gradually get bigger and bigger until it filled the whole sky.
We made out first stop at Erldunda resort where those of us going on to Kings Canyon changed buses and met our guide, Bob. ("Outback Bob") and continued on towards the Watarrka National Park. After a stop for the bush toilets (over the hill)
and a snack of fresh fruit, Bob supplemented his almost continuous commentary by showing us some of the plants and trees which play an integral part of desert life. The next stop was lunch and for this we reached Kings Canyon, and then started the trek.
The first part was all uphill and quite tough going but looking down from the rim , 270 metres
to the canyon floor, was breathtaking.
The terrain round the rim differed widely ,passing though open spaces,
squeezing between rocks, and crossing bridges
treading through grass
or leaping from rock to rock.
We passed the two gum trees which Namatjira famously painted,
and went down to The Garden Of Eden in the depths of the chasm; a permanent water hole rich in plant life including Red River Gums, Bottle Brush trees, Wattles and Figs and ferns , altogether giving it a rain forest look, indicating that this part of Australia once had a more tropical climate.
The view was constantly changing
and quite awe inspiring.
Although the walk was quite challenging we did have several stops when Bob explained either the history, geology, botany of the area or told us of the significance of each place to the Aboriginal people. It was clear that he had a real regard for the local customs and a true affinity with not only the canyon but the outback as a whole.It was a very inspiring trek, staggeringly beautiful and a truly unforgettable experience.
On the way back to the hotel we saw lots of the wild camels that are such a pest to the farmers.
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