Uluru
At 5:15 am we loaded onto the bus in the pitch dark to go see Uluru at sunrise.
View out bus windshield at some ridiculous ISO.
Our local guide, Shearna, set us up with some hot coffee and light snacks once we were in the park. A short walk along a gravel path brought us to our viewing site. At first there were stars and then the sun started to wipe the sky clean.
The sky was beautiful. 10 s exposure at ISO 4000.
Dawn peeked over the hills making spooky silhouettes of the desert oaks and mulga.
Sunrise at Uluru
It wasn’t until actual dawn that Uluru shined. In the distance we could also see Kata Tjuta, where we would visit later in the morning. I guess it is easy to think of travel, and of visiting places like Uluru, as a chance to strike something off the list of places one would like to see some day. But I think that sells it short. For me, the discomfort and inconvenience of going out to see Uluru at the crack of dawn is about putting myself in a situation where a modest transformation might happen. I can have an interesting conversation with someone new about something important to them. The waiting for the sun makes space for that. The giant rock creates a setting where petty is unwelcome. We will be back at Uluru tonight at sunset. I didn’t need to get up early to cross it off my list.
Uluru with Kata Tjuta in the distance
We were there for long enough to take many photos as the light changed. Most are at ISO 4000 until the sun came up. Then it’s 400 and then 100.
After breakfast at the hotel, we went back out into the delightful morning for a little hike at Kata Tjuta, a sacred place where aboriginal populations initiate their boys and girls into adulthood. The ceremonies are not widely known by white people, but we were told that growing up aboriginal children learn new chapters to old stories.
In the late afternoon we went back out to Uluru to see the rock up close and then watch it as the sun set. We also learned about some of the stories that make Uluru sacred and how the Ananagu people make sense of the world. One location at the base of Uluru, a spring, features prominently in some of these stories.
The texture of Uluru is smooth here at the spring despite substantial erosion. In other places it is deeply pitted and honeycombed.
We closed our day with a champagne toast at sunset.
