As promised, here I am posting from Brisbane, where the internet is a reasonable $4 per hour. I've completely wasted my time in this city. I arrived last night and tried to check into my hostel only to find that they didn't have my booking and the only bed they had left was in a room with 7 guys who were sitting around smoking weed. I was already feel a bit weary when I got there and this pretty much pushed me over the edge. After some panicking I ended up at the hotel next door. Then I was supposed to wake up this morning to take a little cruise down the river to a koala sanctuary, but instead I turned off my alarm and slept for 12 hours- till 1am. Now I'm finally up and out, but I still don't seem to have any energy to do anything. I'm leaving for Byron Bay tomorrow and I just can't be bothered to walk around another strange city.
However, before this catastrophe I was having an incredible time in the Red Centre. I'd been warned that some people find the place boring- you go, see the rock, and that's about it. But this was not my experience at all. I just could not believe how beautiful the desert was. There was actually a lot of plants around, even wildflowers, due to some rain they had two weeks ago. And because the dirt/sand is so so red, the green looks amazing in contrast, and even the blue sky and the white clouds seem to stand out more against this bright red. And of course Uluru at sunrise and sunset was brilliant. Right when the sun hits the horizon it makes the rock glow this amazing orange/red color. It was just incredibly gorgeous- and the best thing is that its beautiful in a way that you can't see anywhere else. Its such a unique beauty, and I'm really really glad I made it there to see it.
I kept pretty busy at Uluru (probably why I had to sleep for 12 hours last night). I arrived on Monday afternoon and went on a sunset camel tour that evening. The set up was that all these camels were roped together and two people sat on each camel. Since I was alone I got paired with a grumpy 13 year old boy whose parents and two little sisters were paired up on the camels behind us. Our camel's name was Di, as in Diane. The camels all started out sitting down and then once we were all seated the trainers gave them the signal to stand, which is when you have to hold on really tight while you are rocked back and forth by the camel. Then we did a short walk to a lookout where you could see Uluru and we stopped to take some photos. When we stopped, the guide/trainer guy told us not to worry about the camel's spitting on us- they don't spit on you, they just vomit on you, were his words. Evidently camels have multiple stomachs and regurgitate their food, and if they get really annoyed at you bad things happen with this food. So when Bendigo, the camel behind me, (which was very close, often nuzzling my side and getting very friendly), started to make these repulsive chewing noises, I started to get a little worried. Thankfully nothing happened, and the guys on the camel in front of me took some good photos of me trying to smile while being nudged by Bendigo. I was a little sore when I got off the camel- I can't imagine riding it for days on end, but it was a fun new experience.
Later that same night I went to the Night Sky Show at the "Ayers Rock Observatory" and got to see saturn, jupiter, sirius, and various other things through the telescope. I also had scorpio pointed out to me- which I studied very hard so that I could spot it again on my own. And the guide pointed out an aborigional constellation- which wasn't really a constellation, but an absence of stars, a huge dark area of the sky which forms a giant emu. As soon as he pointed it out (with this awesome laser pointer thingie) it jumped right out at us and was so clear that it seemed crazy that none of us had ever noticed it before. The guide also told us some interesting stories about how a bunch of different cultures (from the Greeks to the Aborigionals) have looked at the seven sisters constellation and all independantly decided that they represented seven women and no one knows why. And also about a tribe in Mali who believe that their god comes from the second star in the Sirius pair... which is a real mystery because the second star is a white dwarf and scientists didn't even know it was there until the 1970s. I haven't been able to verify these stories myself, so I'm not sure if everything the guide was saying was accurate, but it was pretty interesting.
On to Tuesday. I decided not to wake up for sunrise, and instead got a bus to Uluru at 9am, walked a little ways around the base and went to the Aborigional culture centre to read about the creation myths of Uluru and buy some souvenirs. Then I got a bus back to the hotel and had a short break before heading out again to Kata Tjuta, the second major rock formation in the Uluru/Kata Tjuta National Park. Uluru is one big rock, but Kata Tjuta (or the Olgas as they used to be called) is a series of huge domes spread over a much larger area than Uluru. There's one walk through the domes, called the Valley of the Winds, which had been recommended by Andrew as the best walk in the park. Its supposed to take about 3 hours, and is rated "difficult" which I didn't really stop to think about until I got out there. I wasn't sure what would be difficult about it, because I was pretty sure the track didn't climb up any of the domes, and heights are usually what I associate with a hike being difficult. I decided that I'd just turn around if I got to a place that looked scary, and I had my hat, sunscreen, sunglasses, lots of water, and a fly net (I forgot to mention, the one drawback of the desert is that there are flys everywhere and they will not leave you alone- you really need a fly net to keep them off your face and then you need to practice ignoring them on the rest of your body). So, I thought I was pretty well prepared.
The Valley of the Winds walk is a circuit that takes you to two look out points. The first lookout is up a small hill that isn't very far from the parking lot and just looks out across where you are going to be hiking. Then you walk down the other side of the hill toward the valley, where the trail splits and you head counterclockwise on the loop into the valley. Being in the valley, between all these crazy domes, was the best part of the track. There was even a place where the rain had collected from two weeks ago, like a little oasis with flowers growing around it and a goana (lizard) sipping water from the little pond. The other nice thing about the valley is that its all in the shade. I stopped here for a while, really enjoying the lanscape and taking tons of photos. After walking through this valley for a bit, you then go uphill again to the second lookout, which is through a small gap in the domes. You can look backwards into the valley and in front of you to the desert below, where even more domes are spread out. Once I got to this point I thought, okay the second of two lookouts, that must mean its all downhill from here. Nothing had been at all scary so far, so I thought I was doing well. I went down from the lookout and out of the valley. That's when things got rough. The rest of the track takes you around the outside of the domes that you had previously been walking through. It doesn't climb very high but it does go up and down a bit. The landscape is beautiful, but since you are out in the desert now there is no shade. I started to get pretty hot and tired, and about 5 minutes away from the next place to refill your water bottle, I ran out of water while going uphill. I got to the water station feeling a little woosy, so I stayed there in for a bit on a bench in the shade, refilled my water, and prepared to move on. I had to walk up to the first lookout again in order to get back to the parking lot on the other side so I took it slow and did it without any trouble. When I got there I saw a huge Japanese tour group. At one point, one of them pointed out a little red lizard sitting on a red rock right at the side of the trail, I couldn't believe that he had seen it and I said so to the non-Japanese looking woman who was guiding there tour. She said that she had pointed one out to her the group earlier and now they were scanning the path for them. We chated the rest of the way down, which was good because it distracted me from being exhausted. I got back to the bus where my bus driver had another surprise- he had picked up an amazing lizard called the Thorny Devil which I'd seen on many postcards and was dying to see in person. It was so cool! I got to take pictures which I will post soon. Then the bus had to pick up some more people and we all went out to see the sunset at Uluru. It was a fantastic sight, and doubly fantastic for me because when the sun went down Passover was finished! I celebrated by getting a pizza and a coke and watching The Devil Wears Prada in my hotel room.
My last day at Uluru I got up at 5:15am for a sunrise tour. The sunrise again was fantastic, and afterwards we did a little walk to a watering hole at the base of Uluru where we could see some Aborigional rock art. We stopped at the culture centre again, and then went back to the hotel. My flight left that afternoon, so I just had time to buy a few more souvenirs before I left. Then I flew to Syndey, transfered to Brisbane, and here I am. I almost wish I had ended my trip with Uluru because it was so incredible and so unique- seeing it and doing the Valley of the Winds hike has completely satisfied my desire to experience Australia. Now I feel like I'm just killing time till I get to Hawaii, and more importantly get to see C.J. again. Yes I'm a little homesick, but I've only got a week and a day and then I'm done with travelling alone. I can't wait!
Next post from Byron Bay!
Love,
Emma
