Australia and New Zealand Trip: Part 7 (Outback Tour)

On Thursday, April 13, our flight from Sydney was delayed, so Tal and I arrived in the Australian Outback 2.5 hours later than we excepted. Thankfully, however, we made it to our hotel in time to go on our scheduled four-wheel drive Outback adventure to Mount Conner with SEIT Tours.

During our 8 hour tour, Tal and I rode in a four-wheel drive van (shown above) with our tour guide and 6 others, including an American couple from Pittsburgh, PA, a couple from England, and two ladies from northern Australia.

At our first stop, Tal and I walked on Lake Swanson. It was huge salt lake, where salt grew naturally. Due to the dry desert conditions, the salt lake didn't have any water and was one inch thick:

The salt had a pink tint and looked like packed snow, but it tasted like salt (go figure!):

The Outback was a vast, empty, and remote space. We didn't see any houses or businesses.

The desert landscape was dry and mostly flat and included rocky red dirt, spindly trees, and low bushes and grasses:

A 500 year old tree in the Outback:

Our bumpy red road through the Outback:

Tal and I were hoping to see some camels, koalas, or emus on our Outback tour, but unfortunately we only saw some cows, a far away kangaroo, and the dingo tracks below:

We drove around Mount Conner and got some beautiful views of the rock formation from every angle:

At sunset, our group drank sparkling juice while we watched Mount Conner change colors:

At the end of our tour, our group ate a three-course Outback dinner that included homemade vegetable soup and porterhouse steak:

For dessert, we ate bread and butter pudding (bread pudding) topped with ice cream: