Yes , the Uluru is calling…

From very far we have travelled to this special continent of Australia and one of our main destinations is the Uluru!

We take our plane from Melbourne to Alice Springs – while we are flying over the country I watch the red color of the desert below.

It is really exciting – I heard so many stories but was so curious to explore everything by myself over here.

We stay in Alice Springs that night and the next morning our car with our guide arrives – he is the driver and the guide in 1 and we begin our exciting tour through the desert – 288 miles or  463 kms of a road that is totally straight , through this beautiful natural land. Weather is hot, the sun is shining , some little clouds on the way are smiling at us.

We start our journey – the road is that straight that there are special trucks in this region which have up to 4-5 wagons like a long train.

Since there are no curves and there is also no traffic they can drive with such a long tale without any problems.

The endless desert is full of surprises – dingos, kangoroos, wallabies, wild horses , few camels around, birds – all animals have nearly the same color as the desert so that it is not that easy to recognize them.

A little thorny devil is crossing the road – our driver recognizes him and stops to take the little guy aside. Interesting creature – he is definitely part of the desert world with its remarkable design and colors.

We are driving hours and hours on this Red Desert Road , it is fun – what a great experience, I love it!

In the last hour probably we start seeing the great block from very far – it has a grey- dark brown color. The longer we drive, the closer we come but still the rock is so far away.

It is like magic – the rock in the mid of nowhere …very impressive and unique.

The Uluru actually  is the most well known and 2nd biggest monolith in the world and the holy site of the Aboriginal people.

The mountain is 350 m high , 3 km long and 2 km wide and about 600 Million years old!

It is one piece of block which goes few kms under the earth and is therefore geologically unique!

The color is changing to a more reddish brown and finally at the very late afternoon we are coming very close.

We are approaching a place that is exclusively prepared for us – under a huge tent there is a big table with a lot of snacks, some good cheese, some good bread  and some very good champagne waiting for us.

My Godness – what a great welcome.

Besides us there are also some other people coming from around the globe – all globetrotters who came to this location to admire this great site!

The sun is still there , the rock has a very nice brown color like chestnut – it is looking majestic and mysterious , I cant say it differently.

We have fun , we had a great drive through this impressive desert , we arrived at this unique place , we have a great welcome party , we have great people around – what else do we need , actually everything is really perfect !

We stay there , enjoy the view, the natural environment, the colors of the desert, the laugh and excitement of the people , our friends being with us and celebrate this special event with some food and our glasses of champagne – it is a nice moment of our lives and I am thankful to have the chance to be here.

Later we recognize some of the Aborigines , actually this is the tribe of the Anangu people living in this area sitting not far away from us.

They are very shy – very dark eyes are looking at us.

They dont want us to take any pictures !

One mother gets furious when somebody takes the picture of her little daughter – first we cant understand really why but then we are explained that the Aborigines believe that the soul of that person will be somehow captured in that photograph and this is the reason why they are so scared.

So definitely stop taking pictures – we want to be here in peaceful manner and respect.

These people have no income – for this reason they do some paintings.

What they do is actually that they sell what prior was more  a kind of ritual painting.

They paint pictures from the dreamtime ie the time when the world was created around the Uluru -when their ancestors were living here thousands of years ago.

Due to the belief of the Aborigines, the world’s existence and time began here at this place – this is the reason why it is the most holy site for them.

The world is created with some vibration of the Liru (poisonous snake ) and the Kunia ( carpet snake ) and some other mythological figures like the Linga ( sand lizard ) which were coming to this place out of the water and were living around the Uluru in dreamtime over here .

The aboriginal tribes have no letters.

They transmit their culture and history in form of paintings, dances and telling their creation stories from generation to generation.

Each color in their paintings is symbolizing a certain period

Dreamtime is still present for them and in their dances they believe that they arrive at that spiritual sphere again.

This is how they keep their culture alive.

What is interesting for me is that in the Indian mythology the world is also beginning to exist with 2 snakes shaking up the world…what a similarity! There is also the figure of the Linga that exists in Indian Mythology and is a very important energy in the universe as well.

When the white people entered into the continent of Australia the Aborigines were forced to leave their holy and spiritual historical living areas .There was no respect shown to them nor to their culture.

In those days the Uluru got a new name which was the ‘ Ayers Rock ‘

The area became a natural park in 1958 without involving the Aborigines into any of those decisions

The pictures of the Anangu are all so beautiful – nice colors and what makes me feel so proud is that they are all hand painted by these wonderful , modest , proud , natural , nice tribe people .

Finally I select 2 pictures and buy them hoping that I have done something good for them.

We go back to our tent – sun is now going down.

We observe how the color is changing and how another day is going to an end at the Uluru – the color of the rock is getting darker and darker till it is really black.

The sky is dark blue, we can see some light stars – even in the darkness the Uluru looks very mighty!

Being very tired we drive to our close by desert hotel in Yulara.

We will sleep just a few hours and wake up around 5 am to see the sun rising at the Uluru,

Sleepy but also excited we wake up and drive to a place where the sight for sun rise is perfect.

It is still totally dark and also cold – we are freezing and can just recognize the silhouette of the Rock in the distance.

Minute by minute the sun is rising and we watch this beautiful natural game.

It is like a spectacle – the magnificent Uluru is coming out of the dark – again it is changing its color from the black to the dark brown and getting lighter and lighter  to a reddish brown.

Today I want to touch and embrace the Uluru!

It is a holy site and if this is such a special location, there should be a special energy around this block and of course I want to feel this energy, I want to embrace this energy.

Imagine you are at a place where a part of the world believes that life has started at this location very long time ago!

We drive around the rock once – it is quite some distance and at one point where it is close to the rock we stop and climb out of our car to come closer.

Rain has started – rain in mid of the desert !

The rain gives the rock a light grey color – it looks somehow foggy , a mix of brown and grey colors – also very unique to see.

We should be lucky as to see the Uluru under rain should be very exclusive !

Yes, now we have the chance to touch the Uluru and I have to say… the energy is  really special!

It might have something to do with the consistence of the rock since there is quite some iron in it but it felt differently then what I was expecting – not like a normal rock.

I embrace this giant while the rain drops are falling down and we get wet … in the desert which is normally totally dry – a present of heaven to us !

We leave and want to have a look at the museum and also the side where people are climbing up the Uluru.

When we arrive over there we see  a sign where the local Anangu  people ask the visitors not to climb up the rock for 2 reasons – first as it is a path crossing an important dreaming track in their holy site and secondly they feel responsible for the safety of the people as  it is dangerous for them.

Unfortunately nobody cares and people move on climbing up the rock – unbelievable how people can be so respect less and ignoring!

In 1964 there was even a handhold chain added to the rock formation.

I recently learnt that the Board in the Red Centre finally has decided that climbing up the Uluru will be banned on 26 October 2019 onwards which is historically an important date for the site as on that day in 1985 the government returned ownership of Uluru to the Anangu tribe. As part of that agreement, the Anangu leased the site  for 99 years back to the government, and the two parties jointly manage it by today.

On 15th of December 1993 the rock officially got its ancient name “Uluru”  back again .

Till the 1990 s the name Uluru was just known and used by the aboriginal people, while nowadays lots of white people are also using this name for the famous rock.

The Anangu people are living here since about more than 10.000 years , the area was first discovered by a European by William Gosse in 1873.

Our last stop around the Uluru is the awesome Multijulu Waterhole.

It is awesome because under this wonderful rain in this huge desert you find a secret great waterhole with crystal clear water to drink . It is absolutely incredible.

it is like being in paradise as you cannot believe  in the existence of this beautiful water over here.

And you know what is living in parts of this water ? I could not trust my eyes!

It is a special sort of shrimps that is living in the sideways of this waterway – what unbelievable nature it is!

Being wet and impressed we finalize our route over here and head up to the Kata Tjuta region which is also a part of the Uluru National Park.

 

Awesome!