Kings Canyon

I got up bright and early today with the help of the pink cockatoos lol and headed to Kings Canyon do to the Rim Walk. It was about a 10 min drive there and the walk said it would be around 3-4 hours. Now, THIS is what I have been waiting for when it comes to fantastic views.

I started my walk around 7:40am with an extremely steep incline up a semi made rock staircase. I was trying to take it slow since I knew I only had my camelbak full of water which is about 3 liters, and then one water bottle full on the side. I started the trip alone, although the car park had a lot of cars in it, not full but enough. As I got to what I thought was the top, there were two women saying, “you are almost there” and that was an awesome feeling. Until I got to the top and still had a way to go. They said, “we knew it wasn’t the top, but wanted to give you encouragement” haha gotta love comradery! Anyway, I continued to the top which wasn’t too much further alone and from there, the views just got better and better. The walls/flooring along the walk were such a beautiful red! The kind of red that just kind of screams out at you for attention, but blushes when you look. Hahahhaa! There were a bunch of informational signs along the walk so I can try to give you some history as I go along.

Apparently, Central Australia was a windswept plain covered with sand dunes 400 million years ago. The region gradually subsided under all of the weight, compressing and compacting the bottom layers. Silica-rich water inundated the sand and cemented the grains together. That is process that created the rock that I was walking on, in and around today. There was plenty of green trees and shrubbery along the way that had a wonderful contrast to the red stone and in some places with the clear blue sky. When I do these kinds of walks, I am usually looking down so I don’t trip and fall, although I do look up a lot to make sure I am not missing anything. Well in one area where I happened to look down, I saw this ant that was carrying something much larger than itself. So of course I am intrigued and look closer with my camera. It wasn’t an ant at all!!! I am naming this thing a hula bug! It was like a caterpillar/worm like thing that had its back half encased in some sort of bush like cocoon. It was totally weird but awesome at the same time. Also along this wonderful rock were a lot of dead trees. I know it doesn’t sound all that intriguing, but these trees were a kind that might look like they belong in a Nightmare Before Christmas movie lol. They were dark brown and black and all kinds of twisted from the trunk up to the ends of the branches. Just a very different strikingly beautiful thing to see.

Every now and then on some pieces of flat stone that you would come across were ripples embedded in the stone. This actually shows that there was once shallow lakes that covered some of the areas. The only defined lookout (because shit, isn’t this whole thing one big lookout?) was Cotterills Lookout, and you had to go over a small bridge that was built back in 1962 in order the crevice between the set of rocks. Once you crossed over and made your way up some semi steep inclines, the view was even more breath taking. Partially because you were 1: so high up 2: really close to the edge 3: in the middle (sort of) of this big beautiful canyon. If this wasn’t enough, in the middle of all of this greatness was a place called the Garden of Eden. Holy cow! There was a watering hole that you can’t access which is for the better of the animal and plant life. There were palm trees, regular other trees (real specific I know haha), all kinds of shrubbery (cue Monty Python) and tons of animals that you could hear just not see.

View from Cotterill Bridge

Cotterills Lookout

Dead Sea Ripples

As my walk continued up (I had to go down first to find this Garden of Eden) I came back up to the top of the rim again to a sign explaining something about domes. So I read it and had no idea where in the world they were talking about these things. Well, DUH if I had looked a bit further (which I did about 500 yards later) I would of seen what they meant at that time. The top of this canyon is formed in a bunch of domes or beehive looking things. They are actually a result of erosion of vertical cracks in the sandstone which they are made from. From an overhead view I guess it looks like a grid because of the parallel cracks, one set runs nearly east to west and the other from north to south. It is really amazing how wonderful planet Earth really is.