The camping trip I missed

19 May
Alice Springs
Sunny and mild

The students returned from their camping trip last night. I was very nervous about how they would react to the camping tour of the rocks without me along, since it was unusually cloudy. But as they emerged from the bus, they were bubbling over with enthusiasm; they had so much fun. There were a few other campers along, and a second coach ran alongside ours with another group, so they met lots of people their age from all over the place.

The only moment of drama was that a trailer latch had come undone and one of the students had her camping bag fall out along the road, a potential disaster, as her passport was in the bag. After a few anxious hours, it was -- incredibly! -- found by some people who turned it over to the Australian Army. It turns out that because the course booklet mentions ANZAC Day, the folks who found it thought it belonged to them, and so brought it to an army base. The folks at the army base figured out -- again I guess from the course booklet -- that we were staying in Alice Springs and had been camping with The Rock Tour. And so they found us! Far above and beyond the call of duty, that one. All is well.

Our tour guide was a young woman named Hayley. Though I only spoke with her before the students left and after they returned, I was pretty impressed with her understanding of the job and of her clients. And the students adored her. Less-than-ideal weather must put additional pressure on the tour guide to keep the campers engaged, but Hayley clearly was equal to the task.

Women as tour guides are a relatively new thing here; it is one of those jobs that were populated for a long time by Crocodile Dundee wannabes. That's changing in the industry, and it's a good thing. While the students were on the trip, I had a nice conversation with the owners of The Rock Tour, Rob and Joe. They are very careful to train their tour guides to conduct the tour in such a way so that the clients not only have fun, but also learn some important things about central Australia and how to treat the country.

The students spent the evening telling me all their stories about the trip:

1. Everyone did the climb up 'Heart Attack Hill,' the ascent to the rim of Watarrka that begins the hike. We sometimes will have a few students who for health reasons do not make the climb, choosing instead to do the gorge walk, but not this year. I must say, I wonder if some would have made the choice to do the gorge walk if I had been along.
   
2. Hayley dug out a wichetty grub, the larva of the ghost moth. This grub is bush tucker for the Aboriginal peoples; it is thrown on the fire and seared, or eaten live. The taste -- I am told -- is like egg. Hayley got some of the students to give it a go, and I must confess, that alone impressed me.
   
3. Though they were nervous about the 'rustic' camping, ultimately the students seemed to be of the opinion that they preferred that type of camping over the more comfortable camping at Yulara. At Curtain Springs, it was dark away from the fire, so they sat on their swags in a circle around the fire to socialize and eat. At Yulara, the campsite had a large lighted area where everyone gathered. And the lights at Yulara bothered them, as they did not have the same chance to see the stars.
   
4. Not that there was much to see. The cloudy conditions persisted throughout the trip, so that they had only a few moments of star-gazing, around 3am one morning. The weather has been a point of ongoing frustration throughout the trip -- and one does not expect it to be overcast that much in the Centre. It's not just the star-gazing; the lack of sun impacts some viewing opportunities. For example, when we watch either sunrise or sunset at Uluru, the rock goes through several changes in its color when one views it at a distance. Again, the students did not complain much about it.
   
5. One of the tasks that passengers must complete is the collection of firewood. Typically, the tour guide will pull over at a location where there was a controlled burning in the last few years, jump out, and tell everyone to start tearing down the burnt-out trees and breaking them up. I've done this every year, so it was no surprise to learn that the students did this as well. But another way in which their tour guide impressed them was this; after instructing the students to go knock down a tree, she demonstrated by running up to a tree and knocking it over with one scary-looking flying kick.
   
6. Uluru is Aboriginal name for the big orange rock seen in most commercials about Australian tourism; white Australians call it Ayers Rock. At a somewhat inconveniently located Cultural Centre, the Aboriginal people, who are the traditional custodians of the rock, make their wishes known about how it should be treated. At the beginning of the course, I discuss with students the importance of deferring to the wishes of the indigenous people on matters like these, and it comes up several times, so that by the time the opportunity is offered, no one is interested. I am happy to report that none of the students made the climb, and everyone did the walk around -- one learns more about the Rock anyway.
   

So, even though I was not with them, it sounds as though they learned a lot of nice things while camping. Students usually come back from the camping trip a little different: more confident and stronger. When I return to America, you'll notice a change in these students.
But first, it's back to Sydney.