The Ghan

NOTE:  If you would like less narrative and more pictures, please visit my website. 

After our time in Adelade, we made our way to the station and boarded The Ghan.  We spent three days and two nights on this first class tourist train John came to Australia to ride.  (I came to see Uluru, but hey, he's a train guy, and I'm a destination girl.)   

The train was pretty good, except for the en suite bathroom in our compartment, which I won't go into except to say it was a bit like having an en suite sewer.  The Gahn uses older train cars, and I'm hoping the next train will be a step up from the marine style bath on the Ghan.  Not holding my breath, however.  Well, I am, but that's another story.  Anyway, we boarded in Adelaide around noon and shortly thereafter were given our first on board meal as central Australia went by outside the window.  It was the first of several hearty meals, all good, but as usual, too much food.  We rocked along, reading in our compartment and watching the scenery slowly change as the sun set.  Not much sleep the first night.  I forgot to take a melatonin and John was probably too excited.  LOL.  

Not too long after we left Adelaide, this is what the countryside looked like--dry, brown, pretty barren, windmills, some fencing. We are still in South Australia here.

As night began to fall, little flat-topped mountains appeared on the horizon--similar in silhouette to Ayres Rock (Uluru), but not red.  The soil here is still tan.

Sunset from the Ghan

By the second day, we were in the Red Center, as they call this part of Austalia, and the soil is bright red-orange.  This  region is known as the Northern Territories and is usually dry desert.  They have had so much rain in the last couple of years, that the desert plants are very green.  I wonder what this looks like in a normal year.

I have a neighbor who assured me that having Nicole Kidman drive a herd of cattle to market in the movie, Australia, was completely ridiculous.  "There are no cows in Australia," he said.  The soil is too poor and can only support sheep.  Hmmm.  These sure look like cows to me!

Yup, they are definitely cows.  Actually, we saw lots of cattle, but no sheep at all.  They must raise sheep, however, because there was plenty of lamb on nearly every menu.

This is a holding pen--for cattle.

This is the Finke River, or what passes for a river here.  I suppose water covers all the dirt area we see when it rains, but not today.  You will probably need to click on the photo to see the "river."

This is the other thing we saw in great abundance--huge termite mounds.  Again, enlarge the photo and you should be able to find four of them.  They are several feet tall!

Come back tomorrow to hear about our stop in Alice Springs.