The Stuart Highway: Darwin to Alice Springs or viceversa

The Greyhound bus takes around 26 hours to go from one place to the other. I choose to travel on a backpacker bus, because it included some stops and dinner at Daly Waters Pub, one of the most famous and popular on the Stuart Highway.

Northern Territory is literally cut half way in the middle by this highway and there is plenty of places, where to stop and learn about the history of this state. Furthermore there are a lot of spots to discover and walk nearby. It is absolutely outback and the kilometres to travel from one place to the other are big, it could take 3 or 4 hours to reach one place after having left one. While travelling not miss the sunrise or the sunset that bring different colours to the land around, to the rocks and the sky. It's stunning and astonished.

On the way south after leaving Darwin at 6 am, we had a quick stop at Hayes Creek, it just have a small service station with bar and toilets. It's located before Pine Creek, but after Batchelor and Adelaide River. Next stop after Pine Creek is Katherine that is the fourth-largest town in the territory, home to 10,000 residents, that love to celebrate every sort of festival, from sport performances to art and craft, cultural events and so on. The town is also the access point for Nitmiluk National Park and it's surrounded by the popular Katherine Gorge. My stop was very short here unfortunately because the trip had to continue to Mataranka Hot Springs, crystal thermal springs that offer a warm bath. Following the road on the way to Daly Waters, have a look at Larrimah wayside inn, where is possible to camp or stay for the night, but the little zoo, or better recovering area for all the different sort of wild animal of the territory has been built by the owner of the place surprisingly and is free for visitors and travellers. There's always something to learn about birds and other animals ;)

Continuing south, the drive reaches Daly Waters, an icon point in the territory, where a pub was established in the 1930s and every traveller has a stop in it to leave some sort of memorabilia, such as hats, drive license, even bras… Daly Waters was the first international airport in Australia, it was a stopover for the 1926 London to Sydney Air Race and was used later as a refuelling stop by Quantas and as an air-force base during WWII. Take a walk around to discover the first history of the place and some historical monuments in the area.

Following the highway next towns on the way are Newcastle Waters, that has a museum that was originally Jones Store, providing butchery, bakery and saddle equipment, and there's Junction Hotel, built from old windmills. Elliot follows Newcastle Waters, it is a service stop but bird watching amateur can stop to Lake Woods and Longreach Waterhole, both sites attract plenty of bird life.

I stopped at the next service station and roadhouse in Renner Springs and I came back here in order to stay a couple of weeks and make some money. The lookout that is located around 4km from Renner Springs Desert Hotel is worth a stop, but it's not too easy to climb and not mark at all. If you feel adventurous and able to climb it, it gives you an amazing view of the surrounding wide outback.

Another settlement is Banka Banka, established as a cattle stain and an army camp during the 1940s, it was the first cattle homestead used in the region and nearby there's the so called Churchill's Head (in resemblance of Winston Churchill). Have a look at it before reaching Tennant Creek. TC is characterised by its historic mixture culture, combined of aboriginal one, army settlements and mining influence. It contributed to the territory's growth with the gold rush and was useful for the Telegraph Station and during WWII , where an army hospital was built in 1942. Unfortunately the town is not alive anymore and it serves just travellers and few residents.

Next stop, very popular and peculiar, is Devils Marbles, known also as Karlu Karlu in native aboriginal language. It's a formation of red rocks, tinted bright red at dawn, that differ in size from 50 cm to 6 m and stand on top of one another. They were formed by the elements during the time and an explanation of the phenomena is given in the rest area, together with the history of The Pebbles, as the rocks are considered in the sacred Aboriginal Dreaming site.

View of the Pebbles

Dryness in the outback

Another particular spot on the highway is Wycliffe Well, a servo and small town considered the UFO centre of Australia, where murals of alien and two alien models can be captured with the camera.

Barrow Creek is where I've spent two weeks of my travel through the highway in a cattle station (see other post in my blog) and is where a repeater station was opened in 1872 in order to provide communication between Australia and Europe. Now the historic mark, a pub and a service station is what characterised the life there. Close by there is Aileron and Ti Tree, the last one is home to the geographical centre of Australia and to the Red Centre Farm, that produces and sells local wines made with mango and grapes, and more, jams and chutneys. After around 200km I reached the city of Alice Springs.