There's a certain symmetry about all this, I figure, as I sit back in an AAT Kings coach, heading for (where else but) Kings Canyon.

We had left Uluru mid-morning and were now bowling along the Lassiter Highway through what is largely featureless country. Low grey green scrub and little more. Mt Connor, almost as high as Uluru, is about the only landmark, and it soon recedes to become just a lavender hump in the distance.

There are no speed limits in the Northern Territory and some drivers, it seems, take this as a challenge, so there are plenty of rollovers we are told. Sometimes these are caused by stock or wildlife wandering in front of vehicles. Sometimes it's the dead straight roads, mirage-edged at the horizon - or the heat - that leads to boredom and inattention. Whatever. I am glad our driver is experienced, and that the coach has radio connection to the Royal Flying Doctor Service.

Out here you can't be too careful. When Ernest Giles explored this area in 1872, naming Kings Creek, he had to carry everything. It's a harsh land, better suited to camels than people. We don't see any camels in this desert, but are told there are 160,000 wild ones in the Northern Territory, where the human population is only 190,000.

We stop for lunch at Kings Creek Station, (08 8956 7474) where the Conways have battled to make a living out of what was vacant Crown Land until 1982. Ian Conway camped here, under a tree for three years, and wife, Lynn, worked in Alice Springs, three hours' drive away, to get it all happening. But now there is a camping ground and comfortable safari cabins, plus a cafe (bacon and egg toasted sandwiches. and good espresso coffee) and a mini-shop.

Ian, a camel wrangler for decades, proudly shows us his camels, available for guided safaris. There are quad bikes too, ideal for exhilarating guided tours through the spinifex and around claypans and salt lakes, as well as helicopter flights, and walking and bird-watching tours. There's even a Poets Corner where a rock ledge forms a natural amphitheatre and seats around fifty people.

This property has something else too - the last fences between here and the Western Australian coast, around 2000 kilometres away, and Conway reckons it's the ideal place for people to 'get a bit of dirt on them' and experience the Outback.

Kings Canyon itself is located in the Watarrka National Park, and a fifteen minute helicopter ride whisks us up over the ancient sandstone escarpments and above the boulder strewn summit punctuated by rock holes. Next day we would clamber three to four hundred metres almost straight up, and then do the four hour, six kilometre, walk around the moonscape rim. But for today, this was the ideal overview. Literally.

From this perspective, you can see the cliffs rising in a wave, as if swept up in some prehistoric storm, and topped with a froth of rocks, which we would later discover to be substantial rocky domes, but which today glowed orange in the late afternoon light.

We buzzed Kings Canyon Resort (08 8956 7442) where we would stay that night, seven kilometres from the gorge, and marvelled how well it blended in with the sage green bushland, while still delivering all the creature comforts the tourist wants - restaurant, cafe, bar, tennis courts, swimming pools, supermarket, sunset viewing platform, and outdoor BBQ area.

Then our obliging pilot tilted the little blue and yellow chopper and did a figure eight or two for the photographers on board to capture the giant split in what should have been a plateau - the mighty canyon itself - with Kings Creek threading deep below in the base of it.

Kings Canyon is the ideal place for a tough walk especially for those who have done the right thing and chosen not to climb Uluru, as there are no sanctions here. A surprise to many is the Lost City, resembling a ruined citadel, but which turns out, on inspection, to be simply a bunch of eroded rocks. Few argue about the Garden of Eden though, a palm fringed oasis at the floor of the canyon, which is a welcome reprieve from the glaring rocks 270 metres above, especially if you choose to swim there. 

Next day I wandered for an hour along the marked 1.5 kilometre creek walk, the ultimate goal a viewing spot of the sheer ochre cliffs. It's a tranquil space where the glass-clear waters leisurely meander around boulders. And occasionally you can glimpse those other hikers high above on the canyon rim, cooee-ing and waving.

Over 600 different species of native plants have been identified in this region. As I sat quietly on a rock at the creek edge, a thrush dropping liquid notes into the stillness, I admired the ghost gums leaning over the creek. Their trunks glowed even more white against the appropriately green and gold light. Somehow, you get the feeling out here that this is the real Australia.

On the map, Kings Canyon, 227 kilometres south-west of Alice Springs, looks about as isolated as it gets. Yet you can drive there, and it is offered as a coach tour from Uluru or the Alice, or factored into side trips from The Ghan as well. But don't rush it. Plan to spend at least a day to allow time to see it all - doing a rim walk as well as a creek walk, and maybe a flight.

After all, this land has been here a long time. Its secrets are ageless and like any royalty, Kings Canyon expects to have due respect paid to it.

- Sally Hammond