Palm Valley

A highlight of our trip so far - Palm Valley. We were warned that the drive in is a bit torrid, and it was. Bitumen all the way to Hermannsburg so that's great but the next 24 km took us almost two hours. But it was worth it. What a valley.

I'd been there before, 40 years ago on a guided tour, but this time I'm old enough and wise enough to appreciate what I was seeing. Several years ago rangers and volunteers counted every Red Cabbage Palm (almost 3000) and noted that the majority are young trees. Some are up to 300 years old and several older than that. Long may they continue to thrive.

There are a lot of fires around Alice Springs at the moment, in fact several houses had to be evacuated a couple of days ago and Larapinta Drive was closed for a while. Today views on the drive west were obscured by smoke and as we returned to Alice after dark we could see stumps burning close to the road.

And here's a little dragon we met at Palm Valley. We saw several others but they ran away very quickly. They sure can move.