Uluru - Ayer's Rock… this giant monolith is synonymous with Australia, the spiritual heart of Aboriginal Australians, and for many the symbol that they most associate with Terra Australis. Getting to Uluru is quite a pilgrimage in itself - it is more than 450km from Alice Springs, the nearest city, and then Alice itself is pretty much in the middle of nowhere itself. This means that unless you are one with a jet-set lifestyle, you've come a long long way by sealed (or dirt) road to catch a glimpse of the world's largest monolith.
On the road to Uluru you gradually notice subtle shifts in the landscape. As you leave the hills of Alice Springs behind you the trees recede, the majority of the cover is low bushes, and eventually this in turn gives way to short spinifex grasses and bright red sand dunes.
On the horizon you see a large red shape looming, your heart skips a beat, and then you remember that it's not Uluru, but the other, oft forgotten monolith in this area - Mt Conner. Once you've seen Mt Conner the wait for Uluru is half over - just under 200km to go! After a good hour's driving along the Lasseter highway you finally see a shape on the horizon, and yes, that's it, the first glimpse of Uluru. Even in the harsh afternoon sun the rock stands out a bright orange against the horizon in the hazy blue distance. The rock slips in and out of sight as you're driving along (the highway is curvy to reduce driver boredom), until you come to a roadside rest stop surrounded by high sand dunes. A short run up the dune, a few snaps of a young military dragon, and there it is, Uluru in blazing glory, and looking larger than life.
After taking plenty of photos from this vantage point we hopped back into the van and headed for Yulara - the township cum resort that services Uluru Katja Tjuta National Park. Being in the middle of nowhere, prices aren't cheap, but not quite as extortionate as you would expect. Once we had located our camping berth we headed to what we were told was a sunset viewing spot from where we could see both Uluru and Katja Tjuta, but that was still more than 50km away!
As we passed the boom gates that mark the park borders Uluru stuck out, in all its humongous glory. The rock really looks like a hologram - its just so huge, and the colours in the evening light so startling - its as if the rock was placed there, rather than being a natural part of the landscape. I could immediately feel why all Aboriginal tribes of Australia place so much spiritual weight on this area.
A further four kilometers into the park we reached the Katja Tjuta turn off, and that was the last I saw of Uluru for a while. Katja Tjuta is a series of some 39 monoliths that are about as old as Uluru, but due to a different geological composition Katja Tjuta eroded into smaller, distorted shapes, whereas Uluru remained as one giant monolith. Along the long and winding road we spotted a herd of Australia's famous wild camels, and even though we were cutting it close, we stopped to take some photos of the shy dromedaries.
The further we drove, the less we could see of Uluru, and when we finally got to the sunset viewing area for Katja Tjuta, it was quite clear that we had been given the wrong directions! Still, the Katja Tjuta formations are impressive in the light of the setting sun. The rocks gently change colour from a bright orange to deeper and darker shades of red as the sun recedes into the horizon, until they are just a black mass in the distance. Once the darkness fell we made our way back to Yulara for an early night - we would have to be up before 6am to make it to the Uluru sunrise viewing area before the 7am sunrise!
My wish for a slightly cloudy sunrise over Uluru was granted - as we drove in to the park towards the sunrise viewing platforms it was clear that the view we would have of the rock would be fringed by some light cloud cover - perfect for photographs! We made our way to a suitable area where I set up my tripod, and then all I could do was wait and snap. At sunrise Uluru performs the reverse colour changes that we saw the previous night - the rock goes from a black mass on the horizon to a shining orange beacon as the sun rises. The viewing area we were standing on only opened in 2009 and afforded us a view of Katja Tjuta in the distance - with the added bonus that Katja Tjuta was changing colours before Uluru. The distance between the monuments and the difference in heights means that Katja Tjuta is "lit up" before Uluru. The clouds that made for such great photos had the undesired effect of shielding the sun as it rose, so the cold morning remained that way - Justyna and I retired back to the Batvan to catch a few more winks of sleep before exploring the base of Uluru.
The Mala carpark is also the point where "the climb" can be attempted. This is a very controversial issue - climbing Uluru is forbidden according to Aboriginal Tjukrupa (belief system, religion, moral laws - commonly called the Dreamtime): it is a path taken by creation beings in the Dreamtime. Walking on Uluru could be compared to climbing over the altar at St. Peter's, or standing on the sacred stone in Mecca. To add to the insult of walking over such a sacred place, there are no toilet facilities at the top of Uluru, so most people relieve themselves on the face of the rock. Can you imagine what would happen if someone were to pee on the Western Wall in Jerusalem?
The reason the walk remains open is thanks to Western tourism - when the park was handed back to the traditional owners in 1985 a clause was included that the climb should remain open to safeguard tourism, and the climb's status should be reviewed every ten years. Though people's opinion is shifting with education, and many decide to respect the Anangu's wish that the rock not be climbed; this doesn't stop 100,000 people from climbing the rock each year. The fate of the climb seems to have been sealed though, the last time that the status was reviewed it was decided that within the next ten years the climb will be closed. This is due to three reasons - respecting the Anangu beliefs; environmental protection and for safety. As many as 39 people have died on the rock, and many more have succumbed to heart attacks a day or two after undertaking the climb. The day we were at Uluru the climb was closed due to a "serious incident" but I don't know if that was an injury or a death.
Anyway, enough about the controversy surrounding the climb, Justyna and I were at the Mala carpark for a guided walk with one of the rangers who work in the Uluru Katja Tjuta NP. This is an interesting hour's walk that follows part of the Uluru base walk. The ranger explained various aspects of Anangu customs and creation stories - though he could only tell us certain snippets: Anangu Tjukrupa holds that stories can only be told in certain places, and then only by people who have been properly taught, thus ensuring that stories are not lost or distorted over time. Furthermore there are stories that are forbidden, stories for men, stories for women, and stories that are only known by elders.
After the guided walk we drove on to the visitor's centre to gain some more knowledge about the Uluru Katja Tjuta NP, the cultural beliefs of the Anangu and the work of the rangers to maintain the park.
Our visit to Uluru had drawn to a close - this was the peak of my visit to Australia, and I came away from it feeling a renewed awe at the immensity and splendor of the country.
From Uluru we had a long 700km drive to Coober Pedy, the opal mining capital of the world!
No comments:
Post a Comment