Alice Springs

Dear All,

Thought I would write a little blog this evening because I have been here in Alice Springs a couple of days now and have done a few different things.

My plane from Canberra which left at 6.05 am Tuesday, struck a nasty little bit of turbulence about the SA border, (at the conclusion of the journey the pilot thanked the passenger who 'saved' the hostess, but said he did not need to hold on to her perhaps so long!) and we landed quite smoothly. But the weather turned bad for everyone after that in Adelaide and there were violent winds. The plane I was supposed to catch to Alice was delayed arriving from Melbourne by over two hours. I bought a book and diverted myself by taking a photo of the plane when it landed. It took ages to taxi right in and if you look at the ground you can see the swirls of water sent flying by the wind! Take-offs were banned for a while and one place diverted to Mildura. (below) By contrast, when we arrived 2 HOURS LATE at Alice Springs, the weather was clear and the sky blue and you can see the big American Airforce plane which came in like an overfed bird behind us! (On the right)

I was tired that night and the next day spent a fair bit of time doing phone calls to connect with people I need to meet. I also went to the shops to buy some shoes which would not kill my feet and, after looking at every shoe shop in Alice Springs (not a big ask) found exactly what I needed for a bit more than I intended, but I have worn them without problems ever since.

The Convent here is at the south end of the town, near Heavitree Gap. I took a couple of pics of the view out the front.

The first one (I 'removed' the fence in the foreground!) shows the section of the MacDonnell range to the south. The middle one shows the 'front' of the Convent - which is all fence and green roller garage doors; the third looks south west and you can see how close Heavitree Gap is. The Stuart Highway goes through there, so we are very near to it but 3 km from the centre of town. There is a bus goes along near the Gap several times a day, but I haven't had any need to catch it because I have been able to hire a car for my work.

Today I started some of my work activities in earnest - although I had gone out and met up with a Lutheran Pastor on Wednesday. I visited a lovely Retreat place this morning called "Campfire in the Heart" run by a couple about 2 miles beyond the Gap - part of the investigation into possible places to run courses down here. This afternoon I spent time with an extremely nice Uniting Church Pastor who has just moved up here and will be visiting Aboriginal Communities regularly to support local Pastors. I had hoped to travel with him and another Pastor to one of the Communities, but this does not seem feasible. He took my brochures etc instead and I gave him a good briefing about everything.

We have a choice of Mass daily here - 7 am or 5.30 pm. Guess which one I have been going to? It is very dark early, and I like to walk as soon as it is light to save sun damage.

I am very mindful of everyone in this week of the funeral. It went very very well and I hope Leith is happy with what she achieved in preparing it - a magnificent effort. I hope she and the boys, Mary and Jim, and Neil and Kev in particular, are managing OK. I am thinking of you all frequently.

Much love from Rita