I woke up to the distinctive sound of a helicopter taking off for an early morning ride over the canyon. It’s been flying for most of the day. If I was brave enough, I’d love to fly over some of the places we’ve visited and there’s no shortage of helicopters up here. Most tourist places have one. I was speaking to one of the pilots at Glen Helen a few days ago and mentioned my lack of bravery. He told me that he’s such a smooth pilot that he put a crying baby to sleep the other day. He did say that it’s not for everyone. They employ 2 pilots at Glen Helen. They don’t just fly the helicopters; the work behind the bar and other odd jobs around the place.
We didn’t hear dingoes last night but the people behind us heard them scratching around. They don’t have far to come into the park as a national park borders the resort.
It’s been a windy day with a lovely breeze. Robert rolled up the van awning before we left just in case it got quite strong.
We set off about 9:00 a.m. and drove to Kings Canyon. Plenty of others had the same idea – my friend was right with the number of visitors to the canyon. Coaches and other adventure groups were already on their way.
There’s a rim walk that takes about 3 hours and there are many steps to climb before reaching the top so we did the lower walk to another lookout. The path has been constructed and made to look as natural as possible using rocks from the area and concrete coloured a burnt orange/red. It looks good and the path would help to preserve any flora and fauna as people should stick to the marked track. It must have been a massive task to complete and a cairn stands at the beginning of the walk dedicated to Jack Cotterill who had the foresight for this path into the canyon.
Just before entering the walk there’s an information shelter and a water tap that had made a small puddle. Zebra finches, a honey eater and few top-knot pigeons were making the most of this access. On our way back, their places had been taken over by bees and wasps that had climbed right up the tap spout.
Various grasses and trees line the path which shadows a river of rocks that lead into the canyon. Some of the rocks/boulders are enormous and it will take thousands of years of exposure to wind and water for them to decrease in size. The colours are vivid oranges, blacks, browns that change when exposed to the sun. Dotted along the way are tall ghost gums that provide a stark contrast to the rocks. The walk isn’t hard and near the end is a slight climb leading to a platform perched for visitors to look into the canyon.
Parts of the cliff face look as though they have been sliced with something sharp as the rise smoothly to the rim; others have edges and lumps and bumps making for interesting comparisons. As we looked into the canyon, we could see another lookout much higher standing on the rim with a view to the bottom as well as a panorama of the surrounding area. Robert’s planning on doing the rim walk tomorrow.
Our camera is still not fully functioning on automatic and I’ve had to delete some photos because I forgot to make sure the lens shutter was fully open. Bugga!!!! A call to insurance company next week when we’re back home to see if it’s covered.
Missed the sunset – forgot about the time. Tomorrow!
We did head off to see the sunset before realising it was too late and just near our site, we saw a dingo going towards a tent. Someone from the tent walked towards the dingo and it turned tail and went into the bush. Robert didn’t think it was a “pure” dingo. Its appearance did create a bit of excitement especially with the kids.
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