Visit the future of awildland

It all began here at our long-serving, hard working little blog page - a free, open access site detailing our many Australian adventures. But now...we are mixing things up a little and we have (finally) launched our own dedicated website with a changing gallery of never before seen images, new stories and even (possibly) prints and gifts - awildland.com.au. 

But we still love this blog page. It's not going anywhere. Our first blog was published here in 2012. Now the page boasts 137 posts detailing adventures from every state and territory in Australia. It has always been a place for us to hone our crafts and express our love of adventure, exploration and the Australian landscape. 

But, if you have been a regular visitor to this blog or followed our socials, you probably noticed that it all went really quiet in 2020.  

The lapse had many causes - changes in writing motivation and writing time were the main two. Even the simplest of blogs takes many hours of research, writing, and compilation but our commitment to spreading the word about adventure and nature also earnt us nothing. We have always kept this page ad-free and subscription free. And for the blog to continue, we felt we needed something to supplement or supercharge the motivation required to keep blogging. 

So we took a step back, enjoyed our adventures for a while, wrote and photographed for ourselves. Thinking all the time of how to mix things up.  

The end result is a new website! A fresh look and a slightly different approach. 

You can visit us at awildland.com.au

The website gives us greater flexibility and the chance to be more dynamic and varied as well as giving us a platform to promote our professional writing and photography. 

At awildland.com.au our plan is to make the photo gallery ever-changing; with the best on offer and not always tied to a story. We've started small, with themed galleries, but already it contains many never-before-published images. These images stand alone as things of beauty and exploration. The blog posts may be less frequent but still informative with a stronger focus on the story they have to tell, the histories in place and the things we can all do to ensure nature thrives into the future. 

awildland.blogspot.com.au will continue to exist as an archive, as long as blogspot exists. We may move some of the more relevant pieces to the new website and all new blogs will appear there rather than here. 

The idea is to evolve - us and this site; for the blog to evolve with nature and its voice.

Redbank Gorge - Tjoritja National Park, NT

A few months ago we paddled into a mountain - one of our shortest and most accessible adventures yet. But also, one of our most extraordinary. 

Mt Giles, Tjoritja (West MacDonnell National Park), NT

Woke with the alarm at 4am! Walking by 6:15am. Still dark and we use head torches for the first 1-2km before there is enough light to walk by. But, it is a beautiful clear morning - there’s a pink glow in the sky. At the bloodwood tree we stop to put on our gaiters, then, head off track as the first sun hits the peaks around us. Walking through the magnificent bowl of Ormiston Gorge in Tjoritja (West MacDonnell National Park) we are encircled by beauty. Ahead looms our distant destination - Mt Giles, bathed in the light of the day ahead.

The third highest peak in the Northern Territory, Mt Giles, is a well established off-track destination  in the West Macs. It offers vast and spectacular views. There are track notes in print and information online - Chapman, Daly, blogs both old and new. So with all that information out there on the world wide Webber I’m going to let Caz’s photos do the speaking and the inspiring. I’m going to focus on experience and what can be discovered under the surface of the landscape, and the bushwalker.

In the footsteps of the Jawoyn - The Jatbula Trail, NT

A small tribe of bushwalkers are strung along the dusty track as it weaves its way through dry grass and past scattered bloodwood and woolybutt trees. Two of the youngest are out front, Brad and Angus, a fishing rod strapped to the outside of one pack. Kirsty and her daughter Ruby have stopped to rest in the shade and are eating home-grown mandarins. Behind me are Louise, Red and Caz. We are the chatty ones today, catching up on stories after long absences. Down the last rise are Louisa and Shirley, setting a steady pace that comes with years of experience walking wilderness trails like this. 

The dingoes' run - West MacDonnell Ranges, NT

Bowmans Gap

No track markers, no blue or yellow arrows nailed to trees, no signposts. There are just paw prints in the sand that have created a well-worn pad leading along the dry, sandy creek bed. Today we are following a trail of a different kind: the dingoes' run.

The path heads east. It is packed down from regular use. Small prints show the dingoes daily travels to and from the Ormiston Gorge campground. They have set a small, efficient path in the sand and it is leading in the right direction for us. So, we follow, all the way from Ormiston Gorge to Bowman's Gap, which is a north-west break in the huge, beautiful bowl that is Ormiston Pound, in the West MacDonnell National Park out of Alice Springs in Australia's Northern Territory. 

The Giles Track - Watarrka National Park, NT

Riding in the back of a caravan, to the start of a two-day bushwalk, is a first for both of us. Everything is rattling and squeaking as we sit at the tiny table, clutching our backpacks to stop them flinging about as the unsprung van hurtles along at 90km an hour. What if the lovely couple in the car forget we are on board? We peer anxiously out the curtains. A few familiar landmarks whiz past and then the sign that indicates our turn-off. Our driver hits the brakes and the caravan bounces to a stop in the dirt beside the road.