Colin goes to Uluru

We're a bit behind on posting! The most recent excitement was a visit from Colin's mother and 'little' brother. But that will have to wait for a later post (or two).

So, going back a bit: earlier this month, Colin went on a trip to Alice Springs and Uluru (which Europeans also named 'Ayer's Rock'). Naomi wasn't able to come along, sadly (but we're aiming to go back together!). Colin's traveling companion was our friend Adam, famous from some of our earlier posts.

Here's Adam, in the zone:

Needless to say, the pictures that follow are not as pretty as the ones Adam took.

Alice Springs and the road to Uluru


Colin did not fall instantly in love with Alice Springs...

Actually, Colin is now realizing that, since he is writing this post alone, he can switch to the first person. Let's try that again...

I did not fall instantly in love with Alice Springs. I took a few pictures of it, but none of them are worth sharing. It reminded me a lot of a dusty suburb of an Arizona/southern California city. Tall fences around all the houses, a weird overall sense of isolation, and implicit but clear divisions between the ethnic groups.

I've heard that some people love town - Adam knows someone who lived there for years, and really liked it. Perhaps my view would have been different if I'd been there in time for the Beanie Festival.

I had thought of Alice Springs as right next to Uluru. In the Australian sense of 'right next to,' it is: just a bit over 400 kilometers away.

The landscape was much more varied than I'd expected, too. Areas of (well-grazed) grass, hills, and a fair amount of scrubby trees. The main wildlife we saw looked like this:

That's a road-killed something being eaten by crows and a wedge-tailed eagle (the largest flying bird in Australia). I think we saw at least 4 scenes like this.

The road itself (which runs all the way from Adelaide on the southern coast to Darwin on the north) doesn't have much traffic. But it does have a good number of 'road trains' - huge trucks hauling multiple trailers. Here's one:

After many hours, one finally sees this in the distance:

Uluru

During the 5-ish hour trip, one finds oneself wondering "is this going to be worth it?" After all, it's not cheap getting there (even from within Australia), there are tons of nature specials about Uluru, and there's no difficulty finding pictures of it online - a Google image search for 'Uluru' yields over one and a half million results. Add to that that there will be busloads of tourists around it at all times of year. 

But, yes, I have to admit, it was worth it. It's more than a finite human mind can really take in, and that's even without thinking about the role it played for the Aboriginal community for thousands and thousands of years.

I can't think of a description that doesn't cheesy. But the one that came to mind was this: Uluru seems alive, as though it were rotating through the earth like the back of a whale.

Here's one view from the sunny side:

An erosion on the shadowy side:

And here's a full moon rising over it at sunset:

Yes.

Not alone


I am not, it turns out, the first person to take a picture of Uluru with the sun setting on it. In fact, there are two designated 'sunset viewing areas' - one for coaches (i.e. tour buses) and one for cars. Everyone packs up against the fence, cameras at the ready:

Not only that, but the same drill is repeated the next morning, for sunrise. Here's my picture:

And here's everyone else trying to get the same shot:

It was cold, though, just getting down to freezing at night. Some people were braced for it, others seemed to have trouble internalizing the fact that they were in a cold desert.

Other red rocks

Though Uluru is right the most famous red rock formation, it is not the only one. About 50 kilometers away are a series of 'heads' called the Kata Tjuta (an image search for 'Kata Tjuta' only yields about 350,000 results).

They're smaller than Uluru, but there are 30-some of them. Very beautiful:

Further east is a different formation. I'm not sure about the name of the range, but the place we went was called 'King's Canyon.' The red rocks contrasted beautifully with the white of the ghost gum trees:

 

In the canyon itself was water. And ferns! More beautiful contrasts:

This is what it all looked like from above. Pretty otherworldly.

Other things: Salt, a camel, and melons 

The red rocks were certainly the highlight of the trip, but there were other interesting bits.

One was a salt lake. Despite the fact that it had been months since the last (tiny) bit of rain, the lake-bed was still mushy:

Camels were brought into the area back in the day for transportation. Some escaped, and now occasionally show up on the roads.

There are also melons growing:

Yes,  melons. They're not native (I was told), and they're common along the roadside. Food is very scarce, so one wonders why nothing is eating these. The answer (I was told) is that they are so salty that nothing can really eat them... except the occasional cockatoo, who will crack them open for seeds.

Coming up next: The Marshalls take Melbourne.