Today we headed back to Uluru where we will start our travers of the Great Central Road, which is the south western leg of Australias (The Worlds?) Longest Shortcut. However, for us, Uluru is a long drive and we plan on ending the day at Curtin Springs and along the way take a detour to Rainbow Valley. Rainbow Valley it turns out is a small but colorful rock outcropping, the track in is typical red sand and the scenery a mix of red sand, light colored spinifex, and desert oak trees.

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The large letter I on the "sign" is a typical aboriginal sign, car bonnets or hoods, being a favoured canvas.

As we drove south along the Stuart Highway (towards the junction with the Lasseter Highway which leads to Yulara and Uluru) we commented to each other about the very large number of caravans on the road, far more than the last time we drove this section of road. We speculated that, last time we were here the tourist season was obviously not fully underway.

At the junction with the Lasseter there is a road house and we were a bit surprised to see that the parking lot (which is more than 3 acres) was overflowing and the line up for fuel was 20+ vehicles long. We took this to confirm our previous speculation about the tourist season now being in full force.

This speculation was corroborated when we arrived at Curtin Springs, which has a very large camping area (many acres well over 4), and the last time we were here there were maybe 20 camping groups. This time the campground was so full parking space seemed impossible and there was a lineup to get through the gate. We were later told by some locals that the capacity of Curtin Springs was "3000"; we were not sure if that was people or vehicles. We would have believed either.

So not wanting to camp with the madding crowd we drove a few extra km down the road from Curtin Springs and found a track that led off into the bush and a nice patch of red sand with a few Desert Oaks. A night by ourselves to enjoy the tranquility of dusk in the desert, the blazing stars, and even to spot a few satellites passing overhead.