Adelaide to Alice Springs via the Explorers Way - Mighty

Six nights and 1,500 kilometres from Adelaide to Alice Springs in a campervan, up the Explorers Way into the Red Centre.

Port Augusta comes first at the head of Spencer Gulf, where the farmland gives out and the arid country begins, then Coober Pedy, which produces most of the world’s opal and where much of the population lives underground in dugouts to escape the heat.

Uluru and Kata Tjuta follow with a full day there: the monolith stands 348 metres above the plain and continues a long way beneath it, sacred to the Anangu and best seen at either end of the day when the colour shifts, with the domes of Kata Tjuta nearby taller still. Kings Canyon comes next, where the rim walk runs six kilometres round sandstone walls a hundred metres high, then Alice Springs, with the last day spent there.

The camper and the day-by-day plan come from Mighty, and the hire is priced live per vehicle rather than per person; campsites, fuel, ferries, park fees and activities are all extra, with a nil-excess insurance pack available at booking. Seven days for 1,500 kilometres is a brisk schedule with two long highway days in it, and the full day at Uluru is where the value sits. Winter is the season, since summer temperatures in the centre are punishing and the walks close in the heat of the day. The Uluru climb is closed and the ten-kilometre base walk is the better way round it. Fuel should be taken at every roadhouse. This is a one-way hire, so a relocation fee is worth checking at booking.