Australia - Uluru

February 4, 2011 - Friday

We spent last night at Uluru and are leaving this morning for a tour at the Uluru Base and Culture Center then boarding a flight to Melbourne.

This is just a placeholder post as internet is expensive here so I will have to find a cheaper place in Melbourne to blog from....(writing on Feb 6 - finally found an internet cafe in Melbourne to blog from without costing me an arm and leg).

Uluru (formerly known as Ayer's Rock) as we waited for the sun to set

Back in Uluru, on our last morning in the Outback, we toured the base of Uluru then the Culture Center to look at aboriginal history and art.  So far we had been lucky in the weather, beating Yasi out of Cairns and leaving Alice Springs before the flash flood warnings.  On our last morning in the Outback, it was hot, hot, hot.  And the flies they told us about were in full evidence.  We had to wear fly nets over our heads to keep them at bay.  Even then, I sense we were still fortunate in that there weren't as many as there could've been.  Fortunately they didn't seem to be biting but there were still enough of them to be annoying.

I've got to admit - I don't have the fortitude for the Outback.  I'm glad I experienced it on the trip but it isn't somewhere I'd go back to.  First, I'm a weather wimp.  Can't stand the heat.  And even if I could, second, I'm enough of a girly girl to be squeamish about all the insects and reptiles out there.  All the dire warnings about what to watch out for in the outback (snakes, flies, lizards, ants etc) were enough to make me shudder and let my imagination go into overdrive.  Never mind that they had us stay in a decent place at Uluru and I didn't actually have them in my hotel room - just thinking about them and looking for them were enough to make me edgy.

I have to give major props to all the people who can live in the Outback and love it there.  It takes a special kind of person to not only deal with the weather and the bug/reptilian life but also the isolation and the challenging way of life that comes when you're in the desert miles and miles away from the sea or cities.  I couldn't do it.  So you can imagine how grateful I was to board the flight to Melbourne :).