Connections Tour-Day 2

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Today was an early morning. We had a 5 AM breakfast, and then headed off for a sunrise hike around the base of Uluru. However, the weather was even worse than the night before, and we proceeded to be rained on for the entire 9 k hike. yuck! The bad weather did have some upsides; it meant that there were virtually no tourists besides ourselves walking around the base, and it also meant that there were waterfalls flowing off the rock. We are now officially part of the <1% of Uluru visitors who see waterfalls and rain (on the ride out, we listened to a lovely song, "Water on the Rock," about Uluru's waterfalls).

We hiked around the base, met up with Geoff (he'd shuttled some girls off to try to helicopter around the rock), and then went on another walk to see some of the rock art around the base. It was quite impressive, and is still quite distinct despite its age. Geoff also told us some Aboriginal stories of the area, which was really very neat (right up my alley, right now, being in Aboriginal Art here at Uni). We then went to the cultural center, where we got to walk around. I looked at the art there and was shocked at the prices! Much more than in Alice, and I didn't think the quality was as nice. One of the more interesting things at the cultural center was the 'sorry box,' where people were returning pieces of Uluru back to the Aboriginals there. It's supposed to be bad luck to take a piece of the rock away...

After we regrouped in front of the cultural center, we bussed out to King's Canyon. We stopped for photos of Mt. Conner and the salt lake near by, and then continued along our way. We stopped on the way to gather wood for our campfire, and the weather finally cleared (however, we were completely muddy anyways, and the wood was totally soaked!). We picked teams for Jeopardy after getting the wood; I was the first picked (!? wow. I was impressed!). On the drive, we played Jeopardy (loosers got to clean everyone's dishes that night--usually you were responsible for your own), points to be counted over the camp fire.

We set up camp in King's Canyon ranch, laying out our swags for the night. A swag is basically a mattress in a canvas envelope, you put your sleeping bag inside and then zip up the sides of the canvas cover. Be sure to check for crawlies first!

We went on a sunset hike, where we saw the sun set on part of the valley in the distance. After another fantastic dinner by Allie, I went to go crash in my swag, where I could look up above me to see the beautiful southern stars.

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Photos

The start of a very wet base walk
Mmm. Red mud.

Our first waterfall!
Everyone stopped to get their picture taken; see it over to the left?

Interesting formation
Note the holes in the rock, all in a row--pretty cool

Uluru, some more...
I love the ripples in these last two photos.

Looking up
It's very tall

Rocky!
Quite large rocks at the base.

Rock Art
Along Uluru's Base

Waterfalls!
More waterfalls along the rock; these ones were easy to photograph b/c they were so large

Flies! O_o
Isn't that lovely? One of the reasons you need a fly net.

Uluru in the fog
Beautiful

Mt. Conner
Another one of me, in case you forgot what I look like.

Salt Lake
It's not as glaringly white as usual, b/c the rain is making it start to fill

Offroading in the Bus
Collect firewood, kids!

Bush
Out collecting wood, in the scrub

Canyon
The tail end of the canyon near the Station

Comments

[Heather]

hi again
that sunset is beautiful! and i laughed when you captioned yourself saying if we forgot what you looked like HAHAHA! like i'd ever forget what you look like, even if we haven't seen each other since summer.