Moving on again

On our last day in Alice we took off into the countryside to visit Emily & Jessie gaps, important Aborigine sites with rock paintings that are many hundreds of years old. They are of caterpillars, and the locals beleive that if a child is conceived he or she was originally a caterpiller. It was good to get out walking again as we haven't really been anywhere that we could since we came back

The afternoon was taken up with making ready for moving on, all the washing had to be done and the car reorganised, as tomorrow we move on south again, our target is Marla, some 500k.

Leaving early we made our way through the gap to the south of Alice, through which the Todd River, the Road and the Ghan Rail travels, and it is only about 100 yards wide!(see the Alice Springs overlook yesterday) However about 50k down the road we had a blowout- the front offside tyre blew  at 100kph and shredded before we had a chance to stop. We had a good spare- but the way the tyre fitters put the tyres on they are virtually impossible to get off, and we struggled for a while til a gentleman stopped to help. He also had a better jack, although ours is OK his was a good help. We finally got it changed and went on, reaching Marla about 3pm.

A cup of tea was in order, and a biscuit, but we were approached by a rather cheeky little bird who had no problem with eating out of our hands! Of course feeeding him brought along all his mates- so we had to discourage him eventually.    This is one of the better sites we have been on, with a good pool and very clean showers and toilets. An hour  in the pool- a great shower and then into the roadhouse for a great meal. They feed everyone like truckers round here!