FACT SHEET

RED CENTRE HIGHLIGHTS

You probably know about the red monolith in Australia’s centre.

You may know it’s sacred to the Aboriginal ULURU-KATA TJUTA NATIONAL PARK people here, and that it turns some spectacular colours at sunrise and See Uluru rise 348 metres from the desert sunset. You might not know that you can in the deep centre of Australia, matching experience it through Aboriginal eyes, the light and weather with hues so vivid or that there are many other sacred and they upstage the sunset. Walk around breathtaking sites here in Australia’s Uluru’s base with an Anangu guide, and vast centre. Uluru’s cousin Kata Tjuta is learn how it was created by spirit ancestors just 40 kilometres away and you’ll find in the Dreamtime. You can even trace the awe-inspiring Kings Canyon not far the battle scars they left behind. See from Alice Springs. You might not realise Uluru on a motorcycle, from the back of that this landscape has green vegetation a camel or on a scenic helicopter flight. and lush waterholes as well as dusty red Drink in its sunset glow with a glass of roads and huge slabs of rock. And what champagne, then return to a campfire you won’t really understand until you get dinner of barramundi, emu or kangaroo KINGS CANYON AND here is the magic, majesty, silence and underneath a starlit sky. Just 40 kilometres splendid isolation of Australia’s Red Centre. away you’ll find Kata Tjuta - steep, rounded, russet domes formed through more than Trek to the rim of Kings Canyon for 500 million years of erosion. You can breathtaking views across the rugged bluffs ALICE SPRINGS AND SURROUNDS experience both wonders in Uluru- Kata and gorges of Watarrka National Park. The Stay in the famous outback town of Alice Tjuta National Park, which offers tours by canyon’s towering rock walls shelter palm- Springs, which sits in Australia’s red heart Aboriginal guides and accommodation filled crevices and pockets of lush green just 200 kilometres south of its geographic ranging from campsites to luxury resort. in otherwise inhospitable desert. See rare centre. From here you can bushwalk, four plants from a lone-gone wetter age and wheel drive or join a camel trek across the swim in the tropical pools of the Garden of rolling sand dunes of the Simpson Desert. Eden. Explore the weathered rock domes of Bike ride to Simpsons Gap at dawn, discover the Lost City. See sunset at Carmichael Crag, different Aboriginal art styles along the take the Kathleen Springs Walk to a pretty Tanami Track and explore the rock art, waterhole or trek overnight on the Giles artefacts and ceremonial sites near the Track. If camping doesn’t appeal, spend small Aboriginal community of St Teresa. the night in a resort or wilderness lodge. FACT SHEET

FINKE GORGE NATIONAL PARK MACDONNELL RANGES USEFUL LINKS Four wheel drive next to towering Walk the Larapinta Trail or Emu Dreaming sandstone cliffs and the mostly sandy Finke path to Ormiston Gorge and Pound, past Alice Springs River. Mostly dry in Finke Gorge National graceful red river gums, wallabies and www.australia.com/en/places/alice- Park. Explore the desert oasis of Palm cool, clear waterholes. Marvel at the springs.html Valley, the only place in the world you’ll find gorge’s sheer walls rising 300 metres out Simpson Desert the Red Cabbage Palm. You can meander of Ormiston Creek, then dive into the www.australia.com/en/places/sa/sa- through the slender palms on the Arankaia waterhole that is 14 metres deep. You desert-adventure.html Walk or the longer Mpulungkinya Walk. can also cool off in Ellery Creek Big Hole, Afterwards, follow the short Kalaranga Redbank Gorge and picturesque Glen Helen Uluru Lookout Walk for spectacular views of Gorge. See rock wallabies in and around the www.australia.com/en/places/red- the rock amphitheatre circled by rugged ridges and ghost gums of Simpsons Gap. centre/nt-uluru.html cliffs. Or learn about the mythology of the Walk to Standley Chasm and see its steep Larapinta Trail Western Arrernte Aboriginal people on walls blaze red in the midday sun. Don’t www.australia.com/en/itineraries/nt- the popular two-hour Mpaara Walk. See miss the 20 kilometre wide crater at Gosse larapinta-trail.html long-limbed gums stretch over glimmering Bluff, or Tnorala to the Western Arrernte water and mountain ranges turn from Aboriginal people. Their dreaming story Glen Helen Gorge www.australia.com/en/itineraries/nt- purple to burning ochre in the setting sun. is a little more magical than the scientific red-centre-way.html explanation which says it was formed by a comet crashing to Earth about 130 million years ago. In the East MacDonnell Ranges, you can bush walk, camp, four- wheel-drive and visit and the gold rush ghost town of Arltunga.