Australia and especially the Outback was a place I had never really known about except that there were the occasional kangaroo and possibly koala, but that was about it. It was a new continent, and it felt as if I were one of the first explorers setting foot on the outlandish land, full of flora and fauna never heard of before. 

The one thing I did hear about though, was that you should never drive after dusk, and everyone who did got their car smashed up by a road-crossing/hopping kangaroo, according to a local. We decided to ignore all of that and ventured off to the Outback which we quickly learned, was the middle of nowhere, and I truly mean it. Most people may think that most of the U.S. is desolate, but even there every half an hour or so you would stumble upon another miniscule town. 



The only road connecting the south of Australia to the north was surprisingly small. This two-lane “highway” is meant to be wide enough so massive road trains (trucks pulling several trailers) can pass by each other, but it’s hard to see how. Our tiny car barely squeezed itself between the road markings! Hardly anyone drove along this road, and it was noticeable; you only came across a car or truck every few hours or so. 

The only places you could stay overnight were roadhouses spaced two to three hours from each other, all possessing a motel, gas station, convenience store, and possibly a gift store for their merchandise (yup, they have merchandise all right). There were surprisingly many National Parks along the highway, mostly of the gargantuan salt lakes dotted around the southern Outback region. Anytime we got out of the car, 40-degree heat grilled us alive, and above all, hundreds if not thousands of flies pelted down at us from all angles. Just the flies were driving me insane, making me hardly believe how Aboriginals could survive here, in the middle of nowhere, or at least that’s what I thought. 

Along the way to Uluru, we passed one “major” town, A.K.A the famous opal-mining town of Coober Pedy. It seemed like everyone who lived here first came here as a tourist around 30 years ago and never left, getting sucked into the blackhole-like opal rush. After their first couple weeks, someone even found an over $10,000 opal and never found one worth more, decades later. 

It took nearly a week of driving to finally arrive from Adelaide to Uluru, the famous attraction that brings hundreds of thousands of tourists (mostly by plane) to this sacred site. The rock was much larger than I expected it to be, having a nine-kilometer perimeter and peaking just over the height of the Eiffel Tower (348 meters) at its highest point. We hiked along a couple of trails before realizing how much of a mistake that was as we were getting bombarded by more flies. No, but seriously, enough about how bad the flies were, Ayers Rock showcased stunning wind-cut patterns and caves, some even with Aboriginal carvings etched inside. The sunset view of the rock got even better when vibrantly red colors dappled the monolith with hues changing every minute. We were there until dark and by that point stars emanated the night sky, clear as day so you could see the Milky Way. 

After our adventures in Uluru, we drove off to Alice Springs next, the largest town in the vicinity, although it was a bit underwhelming. It was starting to get cooler the north you went, and you could even sense a vegetation change and a humidity level rise. We were just south of the Tropic of Capricorn, and even though this is desert, after a heavy rainstorm every plant in the region suddenly bloomed for a couple of days to get whatever water they could get before it got too late, which unfortunately for us, almost cost our entire trip. 

You see, one thing we didn’t realize was we came during the rainy season, and one thing that this highway is best known for is causing massive floods essentially making it impossible for your vehicle to get past the road unless you had a car snorkel. Two days passed without any luck, and on our third day, we got farther than ever before, before hitting a roadblock – a just-under knee-deep stretch of flood water covering a distance of at least 200 meters or more. Several cars around the same size as ours had stopped too, creating a line-up of four cars not sure what to do in this situation. After an hour of thinking, we decided we were going to trail behind an SUV so the wake would push somewhat of the water out of the way further decreasing our chance to ruin our low-clearance engine. 

After slowly navigating through the water and avoiding potholes created by the flood, we made it through the worst bit of it. Although our initial plan was to head towards Townsville (along the eastern coast), it seemed like it was almost impossible to get there due to floods and a recent cyclone, so we cut our route south to a place called Yeppoon, around eight hours from our original destination. 

The Outback held many surprises especially while driving through, one in particular being the sheer size of Australia; I was shocked to see that the country is around the same size as America! It was also incredible to understand how Aboriginals survived in such an empty ecosystem for over 60,000 years, definitely before any Western explorers/settlers discovered the land. The Outback was entirely different from what I pictured it to be, and instead of the barren landscape I had always imagined turned out to be one of the most diverse ranges of environments from salt lakes to tropical climates and everything in between. I couldn’t have experienced this better than by driving through it myself, and although some parts were slightly risky, at the end of the day, it’s about the journey, not the destination.