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The little trip across a big ocean
Today's adventure was orchestrated by Emu tours. My guides were absolutely wonderful. I spoke to them early in the day about getting the freebie tour, and nobody had a problem with it. The drive to Ayer's Rock was long, but good. The dirt is varying shades of red, with some brown. I was surprised to see vegetation and small trees. About 30 years ago they introduced this buffalo grass and it has taken over, so that accounts for a lot of the groundcover I saw. There were lots of Wedge-tailed eagles, or Wedggies. The only roos we saw were the ones that got hit by cars the night before, and there were lots of them. There was also cattle and camels. They used the camels to bring materials out and build a railroad. When they were done, the cameleers just let 'em loose and they grew from 500 to between 300,000 and 1,000,000. That depends on who you ask though.
After a few stops and such, we went to The Olgas. They are several rounded rocks rising some 400-600 meters into the air and they are red, of course. Everything is! There was a walk to a viewing platform and I fell in with a couple from Wisconsin, my first Americans to talk to in over a month. He is from England and she is from Wisconsin. They were delightful and we visited throughout the day. Everyone has different opinions about The Olgas, Ayer's Rock, and King Canyon (as far as which is best and such). Personally, I enjoyed them and was glad I went, but don't feel the need to classify what I have seen that way. I just went and enjoyed it. The great thing about the tour is that they have a cold fruit for us after every walk. It was delight as it is over a 100 deg C here.
Next was the Cultural Centre, which I didn't appreciate. The Aboriginals make it clear that you are on THEIR LAND and should follow THEIR CUSTOMS. That's fine and all, but I have never been to a country that felt the need to make me feel that way. All in all, I quit reading that stuff after a while because it was pissing me off. Why can't people just go there and appreciate it without strong arm therapy? That has never worked on me and usually brings about the opposite of the desired response. They also try to guilt people into not climbing the rock, but it seems to be about finances. Several of the tour guides will tell you unofficially that they don't respect the aborignals becuase they lease their "sacred land" for millions of dollars and then try to guilt people that want to come. If they wanted to they could close The Rock and noone could climb it, but they would loose alot of money. Enough ranting!! I obviously prefer the Maori culture to the Aboriginals.
Ayer's Rock is huge and I was amazed to see the little indentations, caves, and the like on it. I always thought it was much more uniform than that, but all the imperfections only added to it. They are all around it. The greatest threat to Ayer's Rock is wind erosion and it is increasing exponentially, though the gross percentage is still so small you couldn't see a difference. We took several hikes around The Rock and heard Aboriginal folklore. There wasn't a time during this section of the tour that I was anything other than in awe.
About an hour before sunset they took us to the sunset viewing area, which is large enough for more than 60 tour buses. Our guides cracked open a bottle of cham and prepared dinner as walked to the top of some sand dunes for more views of The Olgas and Ayer's Rock. Dinner was a simple BBQ affair, but very tasty. Some of the other tours passed by as we were eating and made comments about wishing they were with us. The rest of my time was spent visiting with the couple from Wisconsin and watching The Rock change colors as the sun set. God it was perfect!
Afterwards, they dropped me off at the hostel an I made my way to the common area after getting everything stowed. Its a really cool place. They put the cheapest hotel rooms ($170-190/night) with the hostel people. There is an open air (but covered) area in the middle of the property with cook your own steak/roo/emu, bar, pool, take away, and one-man band. At night everyone gathers and you can pretty much make new friends in under a half-hour. I met up with one of the guys that scored me the free tour and bought him a beer. But later on I started feeling crook and begged away. I think the last couple of days, the heat, and a little dehydration just caught up with me.
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