And of all possible places, I went to the most remote one. (warning, tl;dr)
Ayers Rock, also known as Uluru, is the place I visited during the first days of December. To quickly describe the surrounding areas, here are a few words: barren, boiling hot, disturbingly overcrowded by flies.
Taking a bus ride from Ayers Rock Airport to the closest settlement, , one can begin to appreciate the outstanding magnitude of the rock. It looms in the distance, like an omen of incredible power that it simply grabs your attention. It just pops out of the flat desert floor,
Surprisingly, in this arid spot of the country, people do actually live here. Few aboriginal clans have lived here for a long time. And of course, they have their own stories of how this rock formation appeared. Native serpents in the area were involved in a somewhat cataclysmic combat, and the resulting mound of corpses and conglomeration of negative and harmful feelings/energies/wavelengths/etc hardened and solidified to form such rock formation. So the rock then is not really a symbol of the greatness of the country or of the Australian landmass' geological history, but rather a monolith of remembrance of the destructive force of violence and discontent. At least that's one of the few dreamtime story interpretations.
The nearest settlement features everything everyone should have as tourists: good food, swimming pools, air-conditioning, a place to sleep. Seems pretty good. However it's pretty far away from the rock, so this means that you have to take a tour bus, rent a car, bike, or even walk. Rent a car, and you'll save money. Don't walk nor bike to the rock, it's too far away, it's too hot, there are too many flies. Don't go on a tour unless you have plenty of money to burn. It's expensive there, but it's the only place to actually do stuff and still be alive in the desert for hundreds of miles. It is so far away from anything else in the country.
And when you get to the rock, you realize how big it is.
And as an intangible memento, I remember very clearly when one of the tour guides yelled out to the group: "So, HEY, who's excited to see a huge piece of rock?!" Apparently some are. Hahahh
More later.
Nice to see the 'rock' from different angles to usual commercial photography. Great work.
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