Alice Springs

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At the very heart of Australia lies the historic town of Alice Springs. Because of its remoteness, more than 1200km from both Darwin and Adelaide, its large numbers of Aboriginal people and its frontier ambience, Alice retains a special place in the Australian psyche.

The surrounding MacDonnell Ranges are not as well-known as Uluru, 462km to the west, but they are a haven of rockholes, gorges and parks with hundreds of camping, walking, swimming and picnic spots. A major tourist town, Alice Springs makes a great touring base and a diverse and fascinating destination on its own.

You can see the original Alice spring (really a soak) which is still there - the permanent waterhole that clinched the location of the Overland Telegraph Station in the 1870s.

Alice Springs Airport is a modern fully airconditioned terminal located 14 kilometres to the south of the township of Alice Springs with a range of services and facilities available to visitors to the airport. ASA provides facilities for domestic and regional passenger airlines and for general aviation and helicopter traffic. It operates curfew free 24hrs a day.

Things to do

Visit Chambers Pillar Historical Reserve
Lurch around on a guided tour on the back of a camel
Check out Rainbow Park for Aboriginal heritage, paintings, artefacts
Boogie at one of the many local nightspots or catch a live show
Find a bargain at the markets
Fly in a balloon across the MacDonnell Ranges at sunrise
Try your luck at Lasseters Casino
Indoor rock climbing, bushwalking, swimming or cycling
Cricket, golf, football, hockey, soccer, tennis or squash
Horse riding, skydiving, off-road driving, camping

Further Information

Buying Aboriginal art

Since the Pintubi people of Papunya west of Alice Springs began painting their traditional sand designs in acrylics on canvas in the 1970s, the demand for Central Australian Aboriginal art has not wavered. Alice Springs became the de facto centre of the marketing of the Papunya-style dot paintings, followed by the batik experimentation by Aboriginal women on silk and cotton. A revival of the Hermannsburg school, made famous by Albert Namajtira in the 1950s, soon followed. Today all these styles and many more can be found on display in scores of galleries throughout the town. Be warned: there are disreputable delears whose exploitation of artists has been well-documented, although the works of these artists are more likely to find their way out of town.