We woke up before 6.00 again. We heard a car or two leave, and it was just too cold to stay in bed so we got up. We boiled the kettle which got a bit of heat in the back, and gave us something warm to put our hands on! But we left a bit after 7. The sun started to rise just as we were leaving, so it was light but still a dangerous time for being on the road. We got through to the Mount Conner lookout we had stopped at on the way up, just as the sun was hitting the dangerous point – right in our eyes. So we pulled over at the rest area and took some photos, and then made breakfast. We decided to eat inside today, so I packed the bed up and put the table in its place. It was all stuff we had to do at some point in the day so we figured we may as well get it done now.

We left about an hour later and the sun was just above the window so a perfect place for driving. We made it to Erldunda by 10.30ish and saw a massive army convoy stopped there. We used the toilet and then headed up the Stuart Highway to Alice Springs. About 100km up the road it was time for our next stop – a camel farm. Kaoru had never riden a camel before, and it had been 25 years for me, so we thought it would be fun. A 30 minute ride was $45 so we thought that would be better than just a $9 stroll around the paddock. Unfortunately they weren’t doing the longer trips so we had to make do with the paddock. Our guide (who walked us around) was an English backpacker doing rural work to extend his visa. He was relatively new there, and the camel we were riding wasn’t showing him any respect. So getting him to stand took a while, and getting him to sit afterwards was several minutes! I did the first lap, and then Kaoru had a lap. It was a nice break for the day, and then we got back on the road.

We stopped at a rest area for some lunch – we had lots of cheese and nibbles left so snacked out on that for a while. Kaoru also did a final load of dishes. We offered our remaining eggs to somebody who pulled in to the rest area but they were allergic so didn’t take them. We had everything organised, and then it was back on the road.

We finally arrived back in Alice Springs, and went straight to our hotel. It wasn’t quite 2.00 but we were able to check in anyway. We were at the Mercure, which was much nicer than the Ibis we stayed at last week. We had planned to spoil ourselves on this, our last night. So we unloaded everything from the car and took it to our room, which was massive!

We had heard about the botanical gardens, and decided to go there for afternoon tea – there is a cafe that is supposed to be quite good. And the gardens were just behind our hotel, but we still needed to drive as the entrance was round the other side. This was the strangest botanical gardens we had been to though. There was no grass, very few colourful flowers….all desert natives. Which is what you need in this area, I guess! We ordered cake and a hot drink and sat down to enjoy relaxing and not driving for a while.

It was nearly 3.00 and we thought we’d better hit the road, so drove to the servo first, to do a final fill-up, and then to Britz to return our van. They gave it the once-over, and while we were there we asked to be shown the 4 berth vehicle. It would have been more convenient to be able to leave the bed set up, but still have a table inside. It was amazing the difference – a part of us wished we had taken it, and will certainly consider it next time we do a holiday like this.

We caught a taxi back to our hotel, and then I got on to work. Some Inflatable World issues that needed addressing. That took me from 4 until 11, with a bit of a break for dinner. Kaoru packed the bags and got everything organised for our trip home, and we also had a shower which was great to get nice and clean again! It was a later night than we had had for a while, so we were both quite tired.