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Uluru is magical.
More about that later.
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The road into Uluru was spectacular in itself with lush greenery and vivid red soil. So different to what we had imagined. Maybe the colours were enhanced due to the rain. Yes, we just so happened to visit here during thunderstorm weather. The big rock had puddles all around. More about that soon.
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Driving from Alice Springs to Uluru with the van would be too far in one stint for us, being around 6 hours. We broke up the journey for the night at Erldunda Roadhouse.
There weren't many campers. They had camels, emus, chickens and a rooster. The sites were shady and drive though so we didn't have to unhook. We had a fantastic pizza here. Very cheesey.
Be warned though, they charge an arm and a leg for powered sites, petrol being 2.19c and wine as a lot of people like us stay here in and out of Uluru.
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So the landscape driving to Uluru was beautiful. Even when there was not much vegetation. There were also pockets filled with these weired skinny trees that hubby said are called desert oaks.
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We broke up the trip from Urldunda Roadhouse to Uluru by having a break at Curtin Springs for a late shared breakfast. We could see that it had rained a lot here. There were huge puddles everywhere.
They had a funny sign that had America one side and Australia the other and it said -
"In America they have Bill Clinton, Johnny Cash, Bob Hope & Stevie Wonder.
In Australia they have, John Howard, No Cash, No Hope & No Bloody Wonder."
😁
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MOUNT CONNER
We were told that a lot of people drive all of the way from Alice Springs to see Uluru. They come to Mount Conner and think that it is the big rock, take photos and drive all of the way back. True!
What idiots lol. 😏
Mount Conner is certainly magestic. It is quite imposing viewing this big mountain, that seemed to spring out of the horizon as we rounded the bend. It is beautiful in it's own right.
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We stopped at the lookout to take pix and on the other side was a lovely red dirt hill with green spinifex grass growing up it. Very nice indeed.
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ULURU
First sighting yea!
I was so excited!! There it is!! In the distance!!
Wow!!
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Like a lot of places in Australia, Uluru was feeling the tourist pinch due to COVID travel restictions. That was a good thing for us as we were able to book accommodation easily. The campground was only about a third full.
The town here is called Yulara and the campground is part of Ayers Rock Resort. Yulara consists of Resort accommodation, campground, gift shops & an IGA. They have a free shuttle bus service like our Cats in Perth that drives around town all day and into the night. It's also nice that there are free inclusions that you can avail yourself of like the bush tucker experience, or learning to play the didge, or checking out the daily free movies like Big Red or Babe. If you want to buy grog, the only place that has take-away is the Outback Pioneer Bottle Shop, located on the shuttle run. Trouble is that it opens at 4pm. Goodness!
On our first day here, we checked out the gift shops and had a couple of cocktails at the bar at Sails in the Desert. On the way back a storm came in fast. When we got off the bus it was extremely windy and had started to rain heavy drops. We ran past people trying to put their tents and tents on top of cars down. It was a bit unnerving because we were hoping that our awning was still in tact. Thank goodness it was.
The storm went past fast, leaving a nice rainbow and a ton of water on the ground. Part of the Caravan Park was flooded.
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Clouds are great for sunsets.
The campground has it's own Uluru Lookout, just a few minutes walk. Sunset after the rain was gorgeous.
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ULURU
Uluru is 15k's from Ayers Rock Resort @ Yalara. It seems to take forever to get there as the road does not go in a straight line but winds around. In some places it looks like you are driving away from the rock.
We drove early in the morning and the sun was coming up behind the rock as we were driving. I had taken a few quick shots from the car which turned out ok. Hubby finally found a spot that we could pull over quickly.
There is an argument as to whether Uluru is the largest rock in the world. Aparently it all depends on what one defines as a rock. Mt Augustus in WA is actually the largest rock in the world being over twice the size of Uluru. However Uluru is the largest single rock in the world. Confused? Yes I was too.
The difference is Monolith or Monocline. Monolith consists of a single rock and Monocline consists a step like fold in the rock strata. So rightly, both can say that they are the largest rock in the world.
We have also seen the third largest rock, Kokerbin, located in the south of WA.
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I purchased our National Park tickets and saved in my phone. You can get a 3 day pass. Cost is per person and not cheap. I had to show them to the Ranger before entering the park. We came to a roundabout and took the right hand turn to the sunrise lookout.
It is well looked after with fenced walking paths up to the lookout and off to more walk-ways. It's strange that they make you walk in like an S-Curve and rather a long way up to the lookout. You wouldn't want to be running late and miss those first rays lol.
By the time we reached the top, the sun was rising and throwing a warm orange glow on the rock...... in between going behind cloud cover. We needed to be patient for the good shots. 😉
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It's good that you can drive around Uluru. There is a bitumen road all the way around. If it has yellow lines, that means you cannot stop. If it has white lines, then you can stop. There are parts that you can stop and walk right in to the rock. We saw people in a cave that had a paved path leading up to it.
As it had been raining, there was still parts where a trickle of water was running down which is pretty cool. We were here at a unique time indeed. There were parts of the rock that had severe crevices and grooves. We stopped where they used to climb the rock. We could still see the weathered pathway up. Of course the chain has long been taken down.
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| Uluru in a Puddle |
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On the way out of the park we found a great place to photograph the Olgas in the distance.
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SOUNDS OF SILENCE DINNER UNDER THE STARS
Yes, we were lucky to have some stars and thank goodness, no rain.
This is expensive, but so unique that it was worth every minute. They really put on a great show and you can see that the staff enjoy their job. We drove 15 minutes past the industrial site and workers accommodation and onto a dirt track in which the bus could only travel at 20k's an hour, but our fabulous bus driver kept us entertained with his corny and funny jokes.
Everyone just loved bus driver Phil. 😀
He also drives people to the airport and back and we had him on the shuttle bus too. Phil loves to have a yarn and the tour co-ordinator who was checking everyone onto the bus had to crack the whip telling him that we were running late at one stage. Not to mention that just about every place that we picked up people, there was one couple that invariably were running late. That is just so rude I reckon.
Anyway, dinner started with canapes and bubbly and I took a photo of this couple and they took our photo. Mmmmm, not bad. Then we were ushered down the hill to dinner. There was a dude playing the didge and OMG, I just don't know how he played for so long. Must have great lungs! So much for sounds of silence haha. But, he was good.
Dinner was a buffet and each table had it's turn at going up to the food. There was a strong bush tucker theme and roo was also on the menu. Food was ok, but then it would be difficult to produce 5 star food in a bush location. Just the soft table lighting with Uluru and the Olgas in the backdrop made up for what was lacking in the food department. Our hostess came around a few times to fill up our glasses. By the end of the evening, there were a few that had more than their share of grog lol. 😄
The highlight for me was when they killed the light and we had a bit of star gazing education by a fella using a long laser beam to point out the various stars, planets and solar systems. He was very good and we all learn't alot.
All in all, I would totally recommend the Uluru Sounds of Silence dinner.
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Uluru, I love you. 😁
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