Wednesday, June 13, 2018

Riding a camel to see the sunrise on Uluru!

I can now cross TWO items off my bucket list! Although, as that list is continually being added to, I haven't really made a dent in it. But two - in one trip! We had some friends visit from the States and being excellent travelers they planned to see various sites across the country. And, being excellent friends, they invited us to join them on their jaunt to Uluru. Yes please! My Aussie husband had been there once, long long ago on a school trip, but I had never been. Plus, this was a new State for me - Northwest Territories!
And so we went, and it was incredible. We stayed in an apartment at the Ayers Rock Resort which is about the only civilization for miles and miles. They actually do a good job there, really emphasizing the Aboriginal reverence for Uluru, and offering tours that seem to be sensitive to their culture. We were only there for 3 nights so that kind of limited our options, as we didn't want to just run from one thing to the next. So that is how I came to sign up for the "Camel Tour to Sunrise". Fortunately we were there in the beginning of May (late Fall) so sunrise was at a somewhat reasonable time, a little before 7. The shuttle picked us up at Zero Dark Thirty and took us ("us" being one of my friends and I, we couldn't talk the other two into it) even further out into the bush to a camel ranch. And this is what was waiting for us!



 A bit of history - camels were brought to Australia in the 1840s for use in exploring the Outback, some escaped into the wild and they have been quite happy, breeding to pest-like numbers. So this camel ranch rounded up some and tamed them, and now we were going to ride them through the desert to see the sun rise and illuminate the massive iconic rock that is Uluru. If you have never been on a camel, I highly recommend it. They have a swaying almost hypnotic gate, and their height gives you quite a good view across the land. And what a view it was!