9 – 11^th October.

Alice Springs.

We checked into a Motel in the center of the cbd in Alice Springs.  We wanted to recharge the human batteries and take it easy for a few days.  We carted our fridge into the motel room as we weren't moving the car much.  I’m not sure what the cleaners at the Motel thought we were up to as the fridge from the car is 55 liters and full of food!

The car was booked into service on the 11^th of October.  I caught up on the blog and then looked at a couple of the gadgets in the car that were failing.  The rear view camera mirror was prone to not show any imagery from the rear camera.  Rather it was filled with white snow.  I’m sure that we are not reversing on one of the Icelandic glaciers!, so something is wrong with it.  In the end I had to retire it and pop into the nearest auto store and buy another one.  Thankfully they had it on a special with a huge discount.  I installed it and it now works fine.  The other gadget is the black box camera.  It has a power lead that is connected to the cigarette lighter.  This automatically turns it on upon starting the car and off when the engine is turned off.  This means you don’t have to remember to turn recording on or off manually.  For some reason the black box camera didn't get any power and never turned on.  I took the thing apart and came to the conclusion that the problem is in the female mini USB connector on the camera.  For some reason it’s not making good contact.  I don’t have the spares or the facilities to replace the female connector, so I had to improvise!  It’s now working and hopefully will stay that way until we get home.

While here we went out to dinner each night.  The first night we went to a Pizza restaurant and had some pizza for a change.  Then the following evening we hunted down a Thai place in the Todd Mall and had some good Thai tucker.  

I had also booked a table at the Overlander Steakhouse as it’s quite popular.  We went there on the Thursday evening.  As we arrived, the girl at the reception validated our booking and then asked if we were Swedish or Norwegian.  A pretty good guess I must say!  When we told her that we were Icelandic, she was surprised and told us that she hadn't had any Icelanders before.  As this transpired, the manager/owner came from the main office and heard this exchange, so he came over and greeted us.  He told us that he had only had one other couple from Iceland in the 24 years of running the restaurant!  I wonder who they are??  

They always put a flag of their guests nationality on the table, but they didn't have the Icelandic one, so we got the Australian one instead!.  We chose to have their signature dish “Drovers Blowout”.   This includes a sampling platter with Crocodile,  Kangaroo, Emu and Camel meat.  We have had Croc and Kangaroo before, but not Camel or Emu.  Poor Kylie was distressed about the Kangaroo meat, but she managed!  She got stuck in to peas from my main meal and then the desert, which was a creamy passion-fruit Pavlova.  

It was interesting to taste the Australian national emblem animals!  All the meats tasted quite nice, even the Camel!.  The Croc meat is white and tastes similar to chicken, which is pretty amazing for such a wild and aggressive animal!.  The Emu, Kangaroo and Camel all had a wild gamy taste.  You could tell the Emu was meat off a bird.  Overall the food was nice so it was a great evening.

Starting the "Drovers Blowout" with Damper and Tomato Soup.

The sampler plate with Crocodile, Kangaroo, Emu and Camel  meat.  We tried to shield Kylie from the horror!

After the sampler it was the steak with peas!

Kylie just had to try the peas.

The desert was a passion fruit Pavlova, which Kylie got stuck into as well.

We discussed our plans and then decided we would do a day trip to the East MacDonald ranges the following day (12^th of October) and then begin our long journey back to Sydney.  We decided to go via Queensland and take a holiday from the holiday!  The center and north of Australia had become quite hot so it would be better to go to the east coast where the temperature is still below 30 degrees most of the time.  To get to the east coast from Alice Springs, we decided to drive the Plenty Highway to the Queensland border and then on wards via the Donohue Highway on the Queensland side to Boulia.  The Plenty and Donohue highways are gravel track and considered 4wD only.  From there we will drive to Winton and then onto the Capricorn Highway to Rockhampton, which is just over 600km north of Brisbane.   Once we get closer to the coast, I will jump onto a website to find a resort to stay at for a few days.