(Due to lack of inexpensive internet places along the way we've had to put the last three entries on in one go, this one should be read last)

It was hard to leave the Uluru/Kata Tjuta National Park but not hard to leave all the tourist madness. As well as being expensive it was just downright busy. At the sunset viewing spot for Uluru the people camping next to us said they'd counted 140 cars and 20 tour buses, and at the same time we saw three helicopters and 2 small planes. Madness! Fortunately we managed to find our own spot away from it all when we went to see Uluru at sunrise.

For all those who believe Uluru should still be called Ayers Rock it's worth noting it has been 'Uluru' for thousands of years by the people who have lived there for thousands of years, the Anangu; and 'Ayers Rock' only since 1930 when white men "discovered" it.

As usual our plans were loose, and right up until the morning we left we weren't sure whether to go right or left at the end of the road, North, or South... We chose South in the end as we're really beginning to run out of time and need to be in Sydney and Melbourne fairly soon. It was shame as I wanted to visit Alice Springs, but as we've been saying all along, we've got to save places to come back to!

On the way we passed Mount Conner, a huge and beautiful hill off in the distance. We felt somehow sorry for it, Uluru gets all the attention and we'd heard nothing about it. We stopped to look at it, at least.

The North South Highway was far quieter than we expected and we buzzed down it listening to music and pondering over the clash of clutures between indigenous people and western society. It's an incredibly complex situation but it's worth noting that the majority of people who'd told us horror stories about how we'd get robbed, murdered or begged from were those who'd never been to any of the communities or outback towns. All the positive viewpoints we'd heard were from those who'd been working in cmmunities for years, or who were educated or well travelled. Or had half a brain. We personally had no hassle, no negative events, we just met PEOPLE.

One World, One Race - The Human Race. It's really simple.

We arrived in Coober Pedy, main town on the opal fields, with the intention to stay one night, but of course found it interesting and ended up staying three. We found a leaflet for 'underground camping' and thought we'd check it out, so we are now camped in a cave.

In Coober Pedy most of the inhabitants live underground. This has many advantages; the temperature remains constant through cool winters and hot summers, the houses are very energy efficient, you can dig another room if you need to extend your home, and you might find opals as you dig.

It's an eccentric place with a frontier town atmosphere, full of eccentric people, none more so than Crocodile Harry.

Crocodile Harry is a Latvian who's lived here for years, many of them spent in a loin cloth chasing crocodiles and women. He lives in a 'dug out', the PC word for 'cave' in Coober Pedy and for years has opened his house as a living museum. He has a large collection of women's underwear stuck to the walls, I heard a rumour there are the signatures of 1000 virgins on his bedroom ceiling (of course I added mine) as well as t-shirts, thousands of signatures and bits of artwork done by visitors, and many of his own sculptures.

There isn't a bare bit of wall anywhere. Harry himself usually greets every visitor, but apparently he is quite ill and was in bed when we got there. I got a wave from the bed though but retreated fairly quickly before I was 'caught' - judging by the amount of underwear Harry still receives, even at 83 years of age he is still more than capable!

We visited the Old Timers' Opal Mine which I really liked and spent a couple of hours wandering around. I had a go at Noodling, which is another word for Fossicking, which is another word for getting really dirty and not finding much. But I got myself a few bits of 'colour' - precious opal. They are stunning, they catch the light and refract it into hundreds of colours.

We bid farewell to some new friends including Duncan, yet another Scottish descendant, before heading out East to join the Oodnadatta Track at William Creek. Although we would have liked to ride the whole track, time wasn't on our side and we had to start moving South.

On the way we crossed the Dog Fence, a 9600km fence which runs East to West across the country and prevents dingoes and feral dogs from the North (cattle country) from hunting in the South (sheep country) - now I know why Hame suddenly felt at home.

We also passed Anna Creek, the largest cattle station in the world - it's the size of Wales.

William Creek was one of the tiny outback towns we have come to love. Little more than a pub and a petrol station, it is nevertheless the centre of a geographically large community.

We found the Oodnadatta Track was a good road, despite being warned earlier in the trip it had "corrugations so big you can lie in 'em". Even though it runs through a very arid and barren land there was loads to see.

We rode parallel to the old Ghan railway which used to run from Port Augusta to Alice Springs and for 102 years, until 1980, was a vital link to the outside world for the settlers in the pastoral stations. Along the track were ruins of old railway buildings, remains of bridges and bits of the track itself.

We spent the night in the oasis of Coward Springs which was a beautiful campsite with its own spa, built around the natural springs. Unfortunately it was also an oasis for thousands of mosquitos, I got more bites than I've had for years.

We passed Lake Eyre; huge and white, a salty lake which hardly ever has enough water to fill it. Off in the distance on every horizon we saw dust devils, five or six at any one time, dancing their frantic journeys acorss the plains.

Hame just couldn't keep off the dirt roads and I'd grown to love them; so much more interesting with far fewer cars, so after a brief couple of hours on bitumen at the end of the track, we paused in Leigh Creek for the night before hitting the dirt again in the morning on our way to some hills, the Gammon and Flinders Ranges.

The campsite at Leigh Creek had the best camp kitchen we'd experienced (it had sofas and a telly - we don't need much to be content these days!) so as a change from spending the evening reading by torchlight in the tent with a wee dram or sitting around the fire with a wee dram, we parked ourselves on a sofa each for the night and switched on the ancient TV, amazed to find an entire evening of British television.

Back on the dirt in the morning we rode to Iga Warta, a small resort owned and run by the Adnyamathanha people, the indigenous folk from the area. We camped for a couple of days, enjoying the relaxed atmosphere and chatting to the guys that ran the place. Amazingly, even here we found some Scottish ancestory as the aboriginal owners are Coulthards... Clarence Coulthard told us he even had two Hamishes in his family, a nephew and a grandson.

On our first night we had just dropped off to sleep when we woke to a 'clip clop, THUD'. Hamish said "Was that you?", as if I always go clip clop in the night. He got out to investigate and discovered one of the semi-wild horses who lived at Iga Warta trying to eat the bike, and knocking a bag off the back.

It reminded me of a time a few weeks ago when we were rough camped next to the Gibb River. As we sat eating our dinner in the dark next to the fire we heard BIG rustling and crashing in the bushes behind us. I was convinced it was feral pigs - which I'd heard could be dangerous - so we slowly turned our torches on the bushes to have a look.

The torches were only bright enough to pick out pairs of glowing eyes and the crashing in the undergrowth continued. Fearing we were about to be charged Hame wheeled the bike around to use the headlight to see our would-be attacker. What we saw was terrifying indeed, a large head, huge horns, big body. "It's a big pig!" I said. "It's a big pig... with... with horns!" We stared further, in fear. Then I realised. "It's a cow". Oh.

Anyway back to the present. We woke on our second morning to strong winds and the ever present flies trying to crawl up our noses - the flies had been around for the last few days. It was a mission to pack the tent up in the wind, but not as much of a mission as riding in the wind was.

At first it was behind us, making us feel like we were in a vacuum, being sucked along. But as we changed direction we were battling with the wind, poor Hame having to lean all 400 and whatever kilograms of us into the wind. The wind picked up the dust, and soon we were riding through a huge dust storm, with even the sun being blocked out.

After a few hours we were through it and riding in magnificent scenery, the hills looking all the more stunning to us after all the flatness of the previous weeks in deserts.

We'd been moving mostly every day or so for the past few weeks so we decided to find a place to stay for a few days and explore the area. We chose Rawnsley Park, which had excellent bush camping with excellent views to match, a shop which sold beer and a lot of good walks around the area.

(Emma)

PS - The beer is taking its toll on Hamish's physique!