Kings Canyon is part of the Watarrka National Park in the Northern Territory. It is located somewhere between Alice Springs and Uluru, at the Eastern end of the George Gill Ranges. And this is one of the outback’s must-see sights.
After 3 days road tripping in the outback, we finally arrive at the long awaited Kings Canyon, that we will visit before Uluru.
So why change plans and do Kings Canyon before Uluru? Simply because there are thunderstorms in the region of Uluru, and we want to do Uluru with the best weather possible. Also there are no free campsites near Uluru, so staying there waiting for the weather to clear up will cost a lot, whereas around Kings Canyon we can hang out for free (with dead camels but for free!). It rained absolutely all night in Kings Canyon, so it seems like we made the good call. We are in December, so this is the start of the rainy season here. So not unusual to have this type of weather. We hoped we could go walk around the Kings Canyon today but the weather is pretty bad, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to get better any time soon. Thankfully we have a couple days to spare on our program (we actually drove more than expected over the past 3 days), so we decide to do nothing today, and keep Kings Canyon for tomorrow when the weather should be a little better. The only problem is that it’s 7 am, it’s raining, and there is absolutely nothing to do around here. There are only two resorts with a gas station and a coffee shop, but it only opens at 11 am. The day is going to be long… We found a pretty nice free campground North of the Watarrka National Park and plan to drive up there today. Hopefully no dead animal will be waiting for us there.
But before driving we want to check out the weather forecast to see if it will change. The issue is we have no cell reception, and there is no Wi-Fi. Thankfully the guy behind the counter at the gas station has a little bit of reception and gives us his phone to check out the weather. And it looks like there will still be thunderstorms in Uluru over the next couple of days, whereas we should only get some clouds here in Kings Canyon. Good call on staying up here in Kings Canyon. We go grab a coffee as soon as the shop opens. And take advantage of the AC and the power outlets to charge our stuff. It is still super hot outside, and staying in the van is unbearable, especially when we’re not driving.
Early afternoon, we have soaked in all the AC we could and hop back in the van and drive to the campsite we found. It is located about 19 miles North of the park’s entrance, and 7 miles are on dirt roads. We aren’t really supposed to be driving on these unsealed roads with the van. But we already broke the rules yesterday going to the Breakaways, and we’re French so rules are meant to be broken!
Matt takes the wheel and off we go. The road is actually not too bad, and very wide with absolutely nobody. And more importantly it didn’t rain enough to flood the road so we’re safe. Once again we drove on way worse roads in Argentina with our tiny rental Chevy and for over 80 miles. So these 7 miles are nothing but fun!
We arrive at the campground in the afternoon and we are all alone.
The place is absolutely gorgeous.
The view on the Watarrka National Park is incredible.
We go for a short walk around the campground, as the weather cleared up nicely.
We are too far away to go back to Kings Canyon but the view here is also very nice.
The only annoyance : the flies! We were told that there were a lot of flies in the region. And we came prepared with fly nets we bought in Adelaide to put over our heads. We are glad we did. Because when we went out to admire the sunset the flies where absolutely everywhere. It is even hard to take a picture without having a fly on the lens of the camera. Maider has trouble standing still, and moves her arms all around. Not sure it helps much…
But the landscape is so pretty that is (almost) makes us forget about all the flies.
We sit down to admire the nice colors.
Because of the thunderstorm, we didn’t have a nice sunset last night. So we really appreciate this one.
In the Northern Territory they don’t do daylight saving time, so the sun sets an hour earlier compared to Adelaide in South Australia. At 8 o’clock it is pitch black outside which is weird for us.
We spend another great night with only the sound the wind in the trees and the birds. We really love our trip in the outback. Every night offers a different and magical experience (except for the dead camel gravel pit night, if it sounds like we are traumatized by this experience it’s because we are!).
We wake up early, because the sun rises super early. And get out of bed to admire the sunrise.
Waking up in the middle of the outback, putting on a tee-shirt and walk 2 minutes to admire the sun rise on the cliff of a gorgeous national park has no price ! Of course going to see the world known Machu Picchu, Mount Cook or 12 Apostles is awesome, but these more anonymous moments truly make this trip magical.
We hoped to see Kings Canyon under a bright blue sky, unfortunately the clouds decided to stay. Too bad. At least we don’t have rain like yesterday
So we leave to Kings Canyon and get to the parking lot at 7:30 am. And there are already plenty of buses and cars parked. We rarely see so many people do things this early, but here in the outback the temperatures can get really extreme in the afternoon so you better start your day early. Actually if the weather forecast shows temperatures above 97 degrees during the day (which is basically everyday since we have been here) the walk around Kings Canyon closes at 9 am.
So off we go to do the Kings Canyon rim walk. The canyon and its steep 330 ft high red cliffs, offers stunning views on the surrounding national park. This national park is squeezed between the desert and mountain ranges, and is made solely of red rocks.
The walk we choose to do is a 4 mile loop around the rim.
There is a first steep incline to start the hike. Nothing too bad but it is already pretty hot outside so we start sweating. After hiking in the cold for 5 months, it feels weird to be so hot.
Once at the top the view is already incredible. We are already in the middle of huge red rock formations. And have fun taking a few pictures.
We quickly arrive at a first lookout that offers a great view on the cliffs of the canyon.
The landscape is once again unreal.
There are many lookouts on the way that offer incredible views on the canyon, the desert and the park.
So we stop many many times.
A little further is the “Garden of Eden” , where we find a pool of water surrounded by luxurious vegetation. This is a true oasis in the middle of the desert.
600 species of plants, 100 species of birds and 60 species of reptiles are able to survive here thanks to this small water source!
The walk continues and we are still fascinated by the form of these red rocks all around us.
The site is huge, and even if we walk past a few big groups , we manage to be mostly alone along the way.
We can’t imagine how busy this trail gets during July (high season here), it must be insane, so we feel pretty lucky.
We spent about 2 and a half hours visiting the canyon and it was incredible.
The scenery was surreal all along the walk. The rock formations and the huge cliffs are gorgeous. We spent an amazing time.
It is only 9 am when we are done with the walk and we only have 160 miles to drive to get to Uluru. We don’t really know what we are going to do now, because we don’t want to have to spend the afternoon doing nothing in our van because of heat. Luckily we meet a French couple Alizée and Romain. They are traveling around Australia in a van for a full year. We start chit-chatting and hit it off really well. They traveled many places and we have a lot in common. And just like that, after what felt like talking just 10 minutes, 4 hours go by! Time for all of us to hit the road. Unfortunately they already did Uluru and are heading back down to Adelaide. So we have to say goodbye. But is was awesome meeting them.
When we leave Kings Canyon, the sky decided to turn blue again! But we have to hit the road to go to Uluru. This is another one of Maider’s dreams, all the way up there on her bucket list (and Matt agrees with what you might be thinking, Maider’s bucket list seems to never stop! At least that means we will still have things to do when we are both 90 years old). We are still pretty scared about the weather, because even though the sky is clear and blue right now, we know it has plenty of time to change over the course of the next day or two.
On the way, 60 miles before getting to Uluru, we stop at a lookout to see the Mount Connor. People often mistake it for Uluru, thankfully we were told about it so we don’t look like fools telling you guys this is Uluru!
We won’t drive all the way to Yulara, the closest village to Uluru, tonight. Instead we stop in a free campsite 10 miles before. The goal is to sleep here and go visit the Olgas in the morning before settling in a paying campground close to Uluru, from where we can easily drive back and forth to admire the rock at sunset and sunrise. The campground we stay at tonight isn’t as glamorous as the one near Kings Canyon we stayed at last night. But it is perfect for the night, and isn’t too crowded. Matt will go for a walk and take a few pictures.
It looks like the sunset on Uluru is incredible tonight, we regret not driving all the way there today… But it would have meant rushing it and the weather looks great over the next couple days so we keep our fingers crossed.
We spend the evening looking at the stars. The sky in the outback is absolutely fabulous, far from any light pollution from big cities. As with the sky in the North of Chile, here we can see the milky way very clearly.