West2East Challenge Day 5: Warakurna to Yulara

If I thought we were in The Outback yesterday I was greatly mistaken! We’re on The Great Central Highway today and the scenery is changing spectacularly – the road is lined with trees which looked like they’ve been carefully and meticulously planted in line along the side of the dust road and we’re surrounded by beautiful hills – we must be approaching Yulara! Although it’s a ‘short’ day kilometres-wise today, it takes an age to get any distance under our belts due to the road conditions which seem to be best at the side of the road up the sand bank!

The corrugations in the middle of the road make it near impossible to drive on the main section of the road. The amount of dust being thrown around no doubt means the caravans will need a good hoover out before we stay in them this evening but that’s okay – these are regular on-road vans which are being trialled off-road, so there’s bound to be 'a few' specs of red dust here and there, c’est la vie! And to date, the interior of the caravans have coped superbly! We’ve met quite a few caravanners on our journey who’ve provided some valuable feedback on what they do and don’t like about the design which the Bailey Australia team are more than willing to take on board as the caravans we’re using are prototypes. I love seeing Adrian and Gina’s faces when we speak to someone new and they say they know someone who has a Bailey caravan! The style of caravans out here are very different to any you'd find in Europe, which is what is appealing about the Rangefinders. These guys really are passionate about what they do and believe wholeheartedly that they’ve got the best product out there on the market, and I’m definitely in their camp! The caravans so far have performed and coped way more than any expectation and the success so far is a credit to the hard work and innovative ideas which have been involved in creating these prototypes - and long may it continue seeing as we've still got 3,400km to go! 

Red, red and more red dust later we see in the distance  which is… breath-taking! We must be 50km out from Ayres Rock when we see it for the first time and I’m not speechless very often but seeing this extraordinary sight has taken my breath away! I was towing as we approached the iconic landmark for what seemed like an absolute age before it completely consumed our view and the closer we got, the more stunning the view of “the pebble” became. You just can’t compute the scale of everything here – food, cars, roads, distance…and this is no exception! We found somewhere we can park up and watch the sunset in the shadow of The Rock and head to our campsite.

We were the first to arrive and decamp at the sunset-spot and were able to settle into our camping chairs ready to enjoy the show. Uluru is dramatically changing colour – it's luminous red, I can’t believe it’s real – it’s glowing! But not for long; the sun setting for the evening and the atmosphere changes to a more impending, quiet one with everyone stopping taking photos and watching the colour show in front of us until the sun dissolves completely, the temperature drops and Uluru dominates the intensely dark skyline.

Seeing Uluru for the first time today has made me look forward to tomorrow even more - Photographer Nathan and Videographer Josh are going to be taking shots of the caravans from the air in a helicopter, no less! I've got everything crossed for some sunshine tomorrow - The Outback reds, yellows, greens and blue's really pop out in the sun and will make some amazing footage! And rumour has it that if they're happy with the shots and there's enough time, we may have the opportunity to go up in the helicopter too! 

Seeing this spectacular site is the highlight so far for me – what a day! Have a look at some more of the photos here:

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