KEY POINTS:
Outback Australia is in many ways about aviation.
Incomprehensible distances and large chunks of nothingness make flying the logical way to see this vast country.
It is no coincidence that a museum to the national carrier - that's Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services, in case you get
a pub quiz question - is located in the remote western Queensland town of Longreach, one of its first sites of operation. Not too many provincial Australasian centres can boast a decommissioned 747 parked by the side of the main highway into town.
Nowadays flying is not just about transport - 'flightseeing' has become a popular travelling option.
With the use of 15,140 litres of fuel over 9138km, Bill Peach Journeys' Great Australian Aircruise won't reduce your carbon footprint. But, by God, it's the way to go.
I join 31 other air adventurers on a private Dash 8 aircraft in Sydney and take off for 12 days, hopping from sight to sight around Australia's Top End and Red Centre.
Day one
My fellow cruisers are overwhelmingly what my mother likes to term "antique teenagers". Aircruising requires a certain amount of net worth, and time.
While they may be in their autumn years the cruisers are hearty, and keyed up for what many see as a pilgrimage to an Australia they're familiar with but don't really know. I meet Sydneysiders Shirley Towns and John Gorman, friends in their 70s whom I later learn have done several dozen aircruises.
The first stop, for a brief refueling interlude, is the airfield accommodating the retired Qantas 747 at Longreach.
The town's proudest moment still appears to be April 29, 1988, when the Queen opened the Stockman's Hall of Fame there as part of Australia's Bicentennial celebrations.
We dine that evening among the replica early aircraft in the museum honouring Paul McGuinness and Hudson Fysh, the World War I pilots who set up Qantas.
Day two
We have cream scones and tea at the 100-year-old homestead on Longway Station. The property's bubbly matriarch, Rosemary Champion, talks about the difficulties of farming 900 head of cattle on 20,000 kangaroo-infested acres. Back on board and it's off to the Northern Territory town of Katherine.
Day three
It's hot. In this part of the world everything is divided into "the wet" - summer, in our terms - and "the dry", or winter, and aircruising is done in the dry. It's mid-September and as the day heats up it is clear why this will be the last trip for the year.
The other important reason for touring at this time is that the rivers are mere quiet flowing creeks and still pools. In the wet, the Katherine River, for example, will rise up to 18 metres, turning the land on its banks into lakes and swamps for miles and scattering the wildlife.
We take a lunch cruise from the Nitmiluk National Park down through two of the river's 13 majestic, silent gorges. It's a mind bender that we dive into the cool water minutes after spotting a freshwater crocodile - unlike their saltwater cousins these reptiles are more scared of us than we are of them.
Aircruising is a punishing schedule and we fly out again that afternoon to the World Heritage-listed Kakadu National Park.
The atmosphere on board is more relaxed now and flight director Jennifer Whittington, her hair still wet from the river, gets cruiser Ellen Newsom from Mississippi to perform the regulation safety demonstration. It becomes a custom, with a different member of the group asking "have you seen this card?" for the rest of the trip.
In the Kakadu we take our second cruise for the day at Yellow Water, on the South Alligator River (so named by an ignorant early settler).
There may not be alligators but the place virtually moves with other wildlife, including bounding grey kangaroos, elegant jabiru, wild cattle and large, lazy saltwater crocodiles sunning themselves on mudbanks within metres of the boat. They look like the fake creatures of an amusement park, but this isn't Disneyland and there's no way it's safe to swim in these parts.
We stay the night at Gagudju Crocodile Holiday Inn, built in the shape of the ubiquitous animal.
Days four to six
Another cruise and more crocodiles lying around like logs in the East Alligator River on the edge of the Kakadu.
We view ancient Aboriginal rock art at a magical place called Ubirr.
Nobody truly knows how old the paintings are. Our guide was taught by the "Old Man of Ubirr", who under Aborignal law can't be referred to by name now that he has passed.
Images of deceased traditional landowners must also be removed from information boards. On the ride back to the airstrip the guide tells us errant crocs on the roads are a problem in the wet season.
It's a short flight to Darwin and a day off for shopping and washing - the 10kg luggage limit makes laundry facilities a welcome sight.
The next hop is to Kununurra in the eastern Kimberley, home to the lush Ord River irrigation project. Actress Nicole Kidman, who stars in the upcoming Baz Luhrmann epic Australia which was filmed in the area, credits swimming in the waters of Kununurra with the conception of her daughter Sunday Rose. I stick to the hotel pool.
Days seven and eight
The trip around the inaccessible Kimberley coast to Broome provides the most spectacular flightseeing. Captain Steve Weatherstone and co-pilot Alana Clout dip to 1000 feet and obligingly fly around both sides of sights such as the Mitchell Falls - so remote it would take three days by 4WD to get there - and a surfacing mother whale with her calf.
Broome cannot be praised enough. As we fly in, the much-heralded red, white and blue landscape is clear - the ochre earth gives way to fine alabaster sand, which in turn melts into a powdery pale turquoise Indian Ocean.
Established for its pearling industry, the town was settled variously by Japanese and later Chinese immigrants and retains an Asian feel.
The aircruise has been fast-paced to date and we collectively breathe out at Broome, settling into the luxury of two nights at the five-star tropical Cable Beach Club Resort.
The first evening we are treated to the occasional local phenomenon known as the 'Stairway to the Moon' - when the reflection of the moon rising over the sands creates an eerie stepped effect. A haunting digeridoo plays as we join the throngs of tourists visiting the garden bar of the Mangrove Resort, one of the best vantage points in town.
The next day some of the ladies do damage in the town's alluring pearl shops; others take a late afternoon camel ride down the beach. I throw my body into that illuminated ocean.
Later we gather at a spot above the beach where staff serve us champagne and nibbles as we watch the sun slip below the sea.
Eating Thai on the last evening by the resort's "grown ups" pool (it has another family pool where exuberant children are thoughtfully quarantined), the crew and I only half-jokingly plot some minor breakage on the Dash 8 which would require another night here.
Days 9 and 10
Australia's immense distances are brought home as we fly for several hours across the Gibson Desert back to the Northern Territory and Yulara, the tourist settlement near Uluru or Ayers Rock.
'The Rock', as it's affectionately known, holds huge significance for Aborigines.
But it's clear that it is now a Mecca for Australians of all flavours. The comment is passed frequently on board that the Red Centre is somewhere people feel they must visit at least once in their lives.
Again aircruising comes into its own as the Dash 8 dips and skirts around Uluru and its companion formation Kata Tjuta, or the Olgas. We get unequalled views of these strange pock-marked humps surfacing out of an expansive, dry red sea.
We drive past the climbing route up the Rock, a dangerous goat track fitted with chain railings in parts. The Aborigines discourage people from climbing. Their reasons are unclear, but they could be purely practical - one person dies in an attempt to reach the summit each year, and someone is stretchered off the track as we pass.
That evening we are bused out into the balmy desert for the Sounds of Silence dinner.
At a spot between Uluru and Kata Tjuta we watch the sun go down and dine under an enormous star-spangled sky. In these times of urban dwelling and GPS you forget about the constellations, and their importance for past generations in understanding their place in the universe.
I am dragged out of my bed a few hours later to see the sun rise again over Uluru. Our bus lines up with the others and we wait beside tea-drinking Japanese in deckchairs for the must-see moment. After too much wine and too little sleep I am not in the mood.
But the Rock does indeed glow a rewarding rosy pink as the new day reflects off it.
I walk most of the nine kilometre flat track around Uluru, something definitely best done before the heat of the day.
Days 11 and 12
We begin the long haul back to Sydney, but not before spending time in the relative metropolis of Alice Springs. It's nice this time of year, cooler in the mornings and evenings.
We are guided around the old telegraph station, that is Alice Springs' reason for being, by Aboriginal man Alec Ross, one of the stolen generation who was brought up at the station after it closed. He tells us the authorities did the right thing and is thankful for his education.
I sit under gum trees in the warm evening before the farewell captain's dinner and watch the noisy pink and grey galahs.
Our last taste of the Outback is dusty Birdsville and its wacky museum. We know we're in trouble when the men standing on the tarmac to greet the plane are wearing fly nets over their faces.
But where else can you walk out of a historic Outback pub, cross the road and climb straight on board your own private aircraft?
Maria Slade travelled courtesy of Bill Peach Journeys, Tourism Australia, and Qantas.
CHECKLIST
Bill Peach Journeys' Great Australian Aircruise, A$12,995, departing from Sydney on nine dates in 2009. Three of the trips each year have no single supplement
Australian television personality Bill Peach established the company 25 years ago. See www.billpeachjourneys.com.au
Qantas offers daily services to Sydney from Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. See www.qantas.co.nz
