Today we headed west along the Lasseter Highway to Yulara. The surface of this road is just as good as the Stuart Highway. It is rated as 110 kph highway. However, it is very narrow with broken edges in many sections and with few passing opportunities for caravans. In some sections the lane was not much wider than the caravan.
The scenery was pretty much the same as it was yesterday and the days before that. The only difference was the number of sand dunes we encountered as we headed west. They are a deep orange red in colour and are held in place by a scattering of grassy tussocks and low bushy shrubs.
Just before we reached Curtin Springs road house, about 90 kms east of Yulara, Mt Connor rose out the surrounding countryside. Many first-time travellers along this road, think they are looking at Uluru. However, we were warned about this and so we were not fooled. There is a lookout at the side of the road which gives a good view of this classic Mesa or Inselburg. However, it was rather crowded so we decided to stop here on the way to King's Canyon next week. Nevertheless I did take a couple of photos at the roadhouse.
While we were here we finally saw some cattle. I have added some photos of them. Don't be fooled by the apparent abundance of fodder in the paddock. This is a holding paddock next door to some stock loading yards and definitely not typical of the grazing on which these cattle have obviously thrived.
We were about 30 or 40 kms out of Yulara when we first encountered Uluru and Kata Tjuta. You come upon them quite suddenly and they make quite an impression. Kata Tjuta looked like a couple of huge elephants looming over the horizon at the end of the road.
We got into the caravan park at about 11.30 am which was not too bad. We had booked a site with a concrete slab for us to sit on under the caravan awning. However, the site we were allocated was all red dirt. After having a look at the few slab sites that exist in the park we were satisfied that we were better off where we were, red dirt and all. While the sites in the park are large many of them are anything but level.
We discovered that all the powered sites had been taken by about 2.30pm. So if you are intending to bring your caravan to Yulara be sure to book well in advance. You should also note that the caravan park does not have a dump point.
The caravan park is part of the larger Yulara resort. This afternoon we had a look at the resort shopping centre. This provides all the basic services any traveller might need, including a very good visitor information centre. It also contains a couple of eateries and a coffee shop.
If you are coming to Yulara and fancy a glass of wine before dinner, make sure you bring plenty with you. You can't buy wine casks here and a bottle of house red or white will set you back $30.00!!
Tomorrow, after we deal with a couple of housekeeping matters, like visiting the black water dump site, we will make our first visit to Uluru. Hopefully, we will get some good photos.
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