Alice Springs - is actually fairly nice little place in the middle of nowhere, plus you get to (finally) see some true aboriginal characters :) We went to see the Desert Park - it was more exciting for the girls since they like to take pictures of flowers and look at birds. I liked better our 2nd stop there, the reptile center. It's very little, but if you're there for the show, you get to hold and touch all sort of lizards and snakes, sweet! Plus they have one "saltie" (salt water crocodile) in the pool as well. Oh, and my sister bought here didgeridoo here too - despite the fact that women are not supposed to play it! Which reminds me - she didn't believe it, but to play it correctly, you have to learn how to exhale and inhale at the same time, so that you can make continuous sound. I'd love to learn it! Oh and we got our new home-on-wheels here - the Voyager from Britz.
Uluru - also known as the Ayers Rock, about 350 miles SW of Alice Springs. It is the world's largest monolith - which is basically really big one piece of rock. I always thought that it doesn't make sense to travel thousands of miles to see a piece of rock, but it really is worth the trip. It's fascinating to see it to change color during the sunset/sunrise. We also were lucky enough to be able to climb it, which probably upset a lot of aboriginal gods but hey, what else would you expect from white fella :) Reading about the climb, I expected it to be something difficult, but in reality it's just the first 300ft that are steep, the rest is nice and easy walk on the top. We went early in the morning, so we actually were one of the first ones on top, thus avoiding the crowds that followed. Next day we went to Kata Tjuta (The Olgas) which used to be monolith 10 times size of Uluru, but it fell apart ages ago. There's a nice track through the valley of winds (really windy too ;).
King's canyon - 200 miles north from Uluru. To see it, we walked on the rim track which circumnavigates the whole canyon. It starts with steps going up the canyon wall and then follows the ledge. There are couple of side-tracks leading to various lookouts, all definately worth the extra effort. Unlike most other places, they're not paraniod about people falling over, so there're no fences on the cliffs, which makes it much better experience. At the back of the canyon it's possible to track down a bit to see "garden of Eden" with waterhole and some greenery. Nice change from the desert around :)
Katherine Gorge - this was a looooong drive from Alice Springs. Two days in fact, 750 miles. And virtually nothing on the way. We just made a quick stop at the Wicliff Well which is more than just a petrol station - it's an Australia's UFO center! We didn't see any though - except for the plastic ones they have at the front. Next quick stop was at Devil's Marbles - which are oddly shaped, oddly positioned rocks in the middle of outback. I totally see the connection with UFO though! :) So Katherine - it's a huge river which is quite refreshing sight after a week of red sand, dust and rocks. First day we made the "smart" decision to walk one of the long tracks, leading to the 3rd gorge (7 miles one way). It was crazy hot, pretty much nothing to see, so all the way we were hoping to reach the river and hop in. The swimming was nice though. We enjoyed it even more since we didn't know there were crocodiles all around us :) Only freshies (fresh water crocs) though - apparently, they don't eat people. Next day we rented kayaks and paddled up the gorge - only to make it to the very same spot we walked to the day before! To make it further, we'd have to mostly carry the boats, so not worth it. Well at least, this time we did get to see some of the crocs :)
Kakadu - the biggest and most famous national park in Australia. The problem with it is, that you need 4WD to make it to the most interesting places. Probably the best thing we've done in there was the Animal Track Safari - totally worth the money. It's guided by a young white-fella, but he really knows his stuff. He took the group of about 15 of us through a local buffalo farm, where he took a dead goose and fish from freezer for our evening dinner. He's showed us couple of the bush-tucker goodies (bush-tucker is term used for all the things in the bush you can eat - worms, ants, plants, etc.) and tricks. At the sunset we moved to the wetlands edge - to see the sunset better, prepare our meal and get eaten alive by mosquitos. There he built up a fire, let the girls to pluck the goose (at which point I felt very lucky to be a vegetarian :), prepared the fish, baked a bread, etc... Honestly, it was really nice - it was obvious that he really believes all the stuff he's doing, enjoys his time in the bush and has respect for it. In the end, it almost didn't feel like a tour guide. For the rest of Kakadu - we did some walks, watched birds and on the way we went to see the jumping crocodiles.
Lichfield National Park - about 200 miles west from Kakadu. This was supposed to be even better than Kakadu and more accessible to 2WD. I personally would not compare the two too much. In Kakadu it's more about birds, bush and nature. In Lichfield, it's mostly about splashing around in rock pools and waterfalls. I liked both :) There are also huge (15ft high) termite mounds - some are called magnetic, since the termites build them very flat and all orientated the same way (it loooks a bit like graveyard) - they say that the orientation is designed to that they expose only the narrow part to the worst midday sun - make sense I guess.
Darwin - our final stop on our journey through Australia. The city's downtown is tiny - we walked all through it in less than 30 minutes. We went to see the Crocodilus park, which is a combination of crocodile farm and zoo. I got to play with one of the crocodiles - having piece of chicken on a string and teasing the big saltie dude with it :) We also went to the famous deck-chair cinema to see an Australia made movie "The Tracker" - a bit too artsy for me, but the girls liked it. Finally, the night before our departure, we went to see the market at the Mindil Beach - mostly food, but some of the stalls had funky stuff too. Wallets made from frogs, kangaroo balls as shift-stick head, etc. Oh, the road-kill cafe was there too - their motto is "you kill it, we grill it" - once again, it felt good to be a vegetarian :) At the end we went to see the new Tarantino's film (Inglourious Basterds) and that was it!