Thierings on Tour

This morning Jazzy and I woke up early to go and watch the sunrise over Devils Marbles. We probably even got up too early as it took a while to see the beautiful pinks and purples appear in the sky. It was a lovely way to start the day and we got to see a few different parts of the Karlu Karlu park.

The mornings have been so fresh, but once the sun comes up it’s not just a lovely, golden light, but also much warmer! We walked around for a couple of hours in total enjoying all the various views. What a special morning treat 😊
By the time we got back the others were up and having breakfast, which we gladly joined as Jazzy was STARVING from the morning adventures.

Then it was back on the road as we headed closer towards Alice Springs. We had heard great things about Gemtree Roadhouse where you can learn about Zircon and Garnet fossicking and the rocks themselves. 

I organised for the girls to get a bucket of garnet in its original state. This basically meant a full bucket of dirt, with a number of different trays/sieves so that you can first shake out all the excess dirt, then transfer to the next pan which gets washed in the bucket and that’s when you can hold it up to the light to see what gems you have collected. 

Now this kept the girls busy for a good hour and everyone got involved. They each ended up with a small sandwich bag of garnet rocks, which they will try to turn into treasures when back home.

Then we headed to the communal fire pit (conveniently located next to a bar), where we enjoyed meeting plenty of other travelers. It’s always so interesting to hear where people are from, where they are headed/where they’ve been and how long they are on the road. The girls didn’t care too much for the fire chats so busied themselves with playing in the field and collecting kindling in the wheelbarrow. Whatever keeps them busy!

Dinner and bedtime was a bit of a disaster though as everyone very quickly turned from OK to over-tired. It didn’t help that we had the coldest night of the trip so far and that made for a terrible sleep for all as well. Let’s hope for warmer weather again in a few weeks!

Kms travelled – 414