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Notes from my recent Australia Photo Shoot
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Sunday, October 29, 2006 - 10:49 PM |
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Notes from my recent Australia Photo Shoot
I've just returned from this trip, I thought I would sit down and put together some notes about the trip. I traveled with a fellow photographer over the course of the next week and a half. Steve and I left Adelaide, South Australia, on Monday, 16 October, for the 3 day, 1500+ km trip. Our first day was a relatively short day, passing through Gawler, and the Clare Valley (a major wine growing area in SA) - I guess you could say we were following the route of the famous Australian explorer John McDouall Stuart, although in a modern automobile - finally, stopping for the night in the little town of Melrose. Steve and I managed to get a couple of images, our first of the trip outside town, where Steve and I had meal at the local pub/hotel; and what a meal it was, the largest portions I have seen yet in my travels through Australia, followed by a couple of very fine Australian beer - in my case, my favorite Victoria Bitter (VB). The next morning, I visited the local WWI memorial, on a hill overlooking the town.
Our second day was a bit longer, driving from Melrose to Coober Pedy. The country was beautiful rolling hills, until we passed Port Augusta, when it turned into some of the harshest desert country I've ever seen - miles and miles of dry, salt pan lakes, with just a few scrub bushes. It was also quite a hot day; I would guess around 37C. We arrived in the opal mining town of Coober Pedy in the late afternoon, and it was everything I have ever heard of. Most of the population of the town lives underground, many businesses and churches are also underground as well. It was a very desolate looking town, with the aboriginal population seeming to wonder aimlessly from one side of the street to the other. That night, Steve and I camped in an underground campground - it was an interesting experience, but you could smell the chalk from the wall of the old mine where the camp is located, and naturally was just a rocky bed with no amenities.
The third day was spent driving through more featureless desert. However, when we were driving through South Australia, we were restricted to a maximum speed of 110km so the going was slow. When we reached the Northern Territory, where there are no speed limits, we were about to make much better time. We drove about 700km, and decided to stop for the night just 100km short of Alice Springs - this because we felt it would be easier then trying to find a campground in the dark, and we were just plain worn out from the drive. That night we got to talk a bit to Jim Cotterill, who was instrumental in opening up the road into King's Canyon with his father in the early 1960s. Jim also has a singing, piano playing dingo that played for an audience the next morning.
The next morning, we continued into Alice Spring, and then made the final 135km drive to Ormiston Gorge, in the West MacDonnell National Park. This would be our home for the next few days (until the following Monday). Our time at Ormiston was pretty uneventful, we would walk the gorge, take a few pictures, then make the short 11km drive to Glen Helen Gorge, where there was a nice roadhouse for a couple of cold beers to finish the day. The only real excitement came the night before we left (Monday). A Mulga snake, very poisonous, wondered into the campground - this is a very dangerous snake, best left alone, but several tourists, running around in the dark, felt they needed to take its picture. Personally, I just left it alone.
On Monday, we made the drive back to Alice Springs. Steve was due to pick his wife up at the airport the next morning, and to make the long drive back to Adelaide, and I picked up a nice Holden Commodore to continue my tours of the area. Steve and I parted ways on Tuesday morning, he went home and I made the 400+km drive to Devil's Marbles Conservation Area, near Tennent Creek. After a night at Devil's Marbles, were I managed to make a dozen or so images in the morning, and listen to dingo's all night, I drove back to Glen Helen in the West MacDonnell range. The sunset was a perfect wash, overcast and the sunrise the next morning, cloudy as well. |
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