After refuelling in Camooweal we had lunch at the Barkly Homestead, a well deserved stop and a very friendly place. It is run by backpackers, as are most of the cafes we have visited on this trip. They work 12 days straight and get 2 days off. Most are on a 3 month contract.
After the 3 Ways we stayed the night in Tennant Creek, a town of 3 000 that lives on welfare and government initiated work projects. Our caravan park had a spa, pool, bar, restaurant and lots of grass sites. We appreciated this after having endured sandy sites on a few occasions in the past. There were several workers at the caravan park from all over Australia. They were hired to repair the indigenous population's houses; something they do regularly.
We headed off to Alice Springs where the Hog rally is to be held, and finally after 6000 km of sunshine we hit a storm that lasted for 100 km.
It was so bad we had to lean into the wind and reduce the speed to 50 kph, though even at this speed we were still passing cars.
The Alice Springs Hog Rally started on Friday the 3rd and we were there to participate in the rally and to catch up with Marie-Louise's son Daniel, his wife Theresa and four grandkids.
We enjoyed the Thunder Run on the Saturday but the highlight for both of us was riding the bike and trailer through the Bojangles Pub on the Sunday, along with 120 other Harleys. The Bojangles pub is famous and broadcasts live around the world with over 5,000,000 hits last month.
On Monday morning we woke the grandkids (Yoshi 7, Erika 11, Anne-Louise 13, and Stefan 15) at 4am to take a two day bus trip to Uluru, King's Canyon and the Olgas.
It was a return trip of 1000 km, with a 6.2 km walk around Kings Canyon over some huge hills and more than 10 km around Uluru. We were so proud of all the kids especially the youngest ones Yoshi and Erika who never once complained.
We enjoyed the camping and cooking and met some interesting people from all around the globe.
It was a great weekend, very tiring but camping with the grandkids in this wonderful country is something we will always treasure.
Alice Springs with its population of 28,000 surprised us. The locals love it here. It is an expensive town with house prices over 500k. There are around 8000 aboriginals who need help badly. Alcohol and the tribal way of 'what's yours is mine' is a huge problem.
Also idle hands make idle minds as very few work and they rely on the dole.
We are flying out in the morning for Sydney via Melbourne for Graeme's granddaughter Isabella's first birthday. We shall be back in Alice in about a week to head for Darwin .
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