Day 10 Uluru

                                       

We awoke this morning to crystal clear star-drenched skies at 4:15 am to hike the base of Uluru at sunrise..  Temps this morning were more what we expected this time of year, and Jeri soon shed all of her layers (but the last).  It is understandable why the Aboriginal people wore nothing but body paint.  

                                        

                                
The base walk was about 13km (8 miles for the non-metric thinkers).  Hiking here, though, is nothing like at home.  The trail is wide, flat (one spot had about a 5’ elevation gain),  with no roots or rocks.  The mountain was open to climbing before 8 am (after that it is closed due to high heat), but it is highly discouraged for several reasons. 
                                               
First, and foremost, this is sacred ground for the Aboriginal people with many of their “Dreamtime” or creation myths taking place here.  There are several areas where photographs are not permitted because the Aboriginal people believe that until a young tribe member is initiated (?Bar Mitzvahed) he or she is not supposed to have any knowledge of these sacred sites, and if they see a photo, they could be severely punished (exile from the tribe!).  Today with internet everywhere (even in Uluru) an innocent posting on Facebook could be catastrophic for a young Aboriginal person.  The second reason is the destruction of the ecosystem.  Hikers create waste, both solid and liquid, which ends up at the base of the monolith, contaminating the scarce water. Hi lithium (from discarded batteries) and E. Coli (from you know what) has been found in high levels in the water holes at the base.  Lastly, the hike is dangerous, particularly the journey down.  Well over 300 people have died climbing Uluru, more than Mt. Everest.  Most problems are associated with stupidity, hiking with no water, in Crocs (that have been known to melt when the temperatures reach 120-130°F, or when severely out of shape.  Many people have to be rescued when they freak toward the bottom where there is no chain for support.  We sat and watched a group of hikers get stuck at this point and after 20 minutes (we were taking a bathroom break) hadn’t descended more that 20 feet.  Our guide thought she might still see them there tomorrow morning on her next walk. 
                                        
The chain was put up there in 1960, commissioned by the Australian government before they considered the rights of the Aboriginal peoples.  They instructed a local bush guide to  put the chain in waist high.  What they failed to know was that the guide was only about 4’6”, so the chain is pretty useless for all but children and the vertically challenged.

Our guide regaled us with Dreamtime stories that surrounded Uluru.  The stories all include instruction for correct behavior (morals), and survival.  They all involved giant creatures that can transform into a variety of animals.  This made following some of the stories fairly difficult.  You really need an open mind (and perhaps some mind expanding  drugs) to  figure the stories out. There were also several areas of cave drawings some dating back 2,000 years.  Each of the designs represented things in nature, like concentric circles represented waterholes, basic for survival in this harsh environment.
                                       

Though sparse, there was some wildlife (birds) in the area including yellow honey eaters and willie wag-tail.
       

                                          

By the time we got back to the van, I was having some pretty severe caffeine withdrawal, so the first order of business was a “long black” (actually 2) and then some breakfast.  It was now 1100 am, and we were 7 hours into the day already.  I am writing this part of the blog sitting under a tree by the pool (with Jeri napping).  Next on the agenda is a 3-4 hour hike to Kata Tjutak, the other nearby rock formation.  Then we get back and head out to the dinner under the stars (which we were going to do last night but bailed because of the weather).  I think we will sleep well tonight.

After a quick swim and a power nap, we loaded up the backpacks for our hike into the canyon at Kata Tjuta.  The temperature had climbed considerably since early this morning and was now well into the 90’s.  Kata Tjuta is about a 30 min drive from the resort complex, though it looked much closer.  Both Uluru and Kata Tjuta were both formed by sedimentary deposits at the base of  mountains that have long since eroded away.  The sedimentaion that produced Uluru was very fine and homogeneous leading to the smooth monolith that we find today.  Kata Tjuta, on the other hand,  consisted of both fine sediment  mixed with varying sizes of igneous rocks all getting compressed over time to yield a composite rock that  almost looks manmade. We had a small group, 2 Americans that were with us in the morning, a german couple, and a single woman from London.  We were all pretty enthusiastic about the hike, unfortunately, our guide was not.  He seemed quite bored with the whole thing.  The rest of us enjoyed ourselves for the 1.5 mi hike into the canyon between Mt. Olga (1500 ft) and the adjacent  mountain whose name we were never told.  The European name for this area is the Olgas from the tallest of the mountains.
    

                                 

                                                      

The area was very desolate, but there were scattered patches  of pretty dense vegetation.  There was also a small rivulet which carried the occasional rainwater down to a sacred waterhole.  It did afford us a nice photograph of the canyon’s reflection in a small pool.

                                                 

After the hike, we got back to the hotel just in time to take a quick shower and change for our dinner under the stars.  The weather held and we watched the sunset on Uluru with cloudless skies.  We had drinks and appetizers as the sun drifted down. 
                                         

                                         
Appetizers afforded us our first local delicacies, kangaroo, and crocodile. Kangaroo tasted like very lean beef and the crocodile was pureed on a piece of cucumber.  It was tasty, but non-descript. We were also entertained by a didgeridoo player.  The instrument is called a didgeridoo because of the sound it makes (I’ll try to post a short video-don’t know if it will work), but the actual Aboriginal name is something unpronounceable, but translated means “hollow stick”.
                                                

 I was looking around for someone who might know how to use my camera so that Jeri and I could get a photo together, and I spied a young couple with a Canon DSLR.  We got to talking and it turned out that they were honeymooning here from L.A., but she was a 2005 graduate of Dartmouth.  We wound up sitting with them for dinner and had a very enjoyable evening crashing their honeymoon.  

During dinner, we were entertained with  Aboriginal dancing, followed by a tour of the southern night sky.  
                                      
The person that did the talk was excellent (almost as enjoyable as listening to Brendan do this) and then afterwards, set up a couple of 8” telescopes to look at the Magellanic Cloud near the Pleides (Seven Sisters)and the moon surface.  The Southern Cross unfortunately was below the horizon until early in the morning this time of year at this latitude so we could not see it.  He did give us an alternative method to find north, in case we got lost going back to the bus.

The evening ended with excellent dessert and Port.  We returned to our hotel room at Sails in the Desert full and exhausted.