Australia: Kata Tjuta

Travel Date: 19 August 2013

Just like watching the swirling colours of the sunset on Uluru the night before, watching the sunrise behind Uluru, illuminating its neighbouring rock formation, Kata Tjuta (better known as The Olgas) is not to be missed! Our tour was woken up nice and early in the pitch black and chilly cold. We quickly collected our belongings and rolled up our swags, and clambered into the tour bus for a 40-minute drive west to a viewing platform bang in the middle of the two amazing rock formations.

The sunrise in the east behind Uluru

The Olgas are in some ways more impressive than Uluru, albeit being much less known (though they feature prominently in the opening sequence to the Disney film The Rescuers Down Under). Whereas Uluru is one massive rock, Kata Tjuta is a cluster of towering rock stacks with rounded tops, and they are even taller than Uluru! Geologically, the rocks at Kata Tjuta and Uluru date back over 500 million years! An ancient mountain range to the west that was created during the Petermann Orogengy was the source for all of the sand and boulders that were eroded from the mountains and deposited in a large basin to the east of the mountains. Over time, these sediments built up and compressed earlier depositional strata into the sandstone and conglomerates that make up these rock formations. Over time, further compression and faulting tilted the rocks such that previously horizontal strata are now almost vertical! While Uluru is mostly sandstone, large boulders stick out of the steep conglomerate rock walls of Kata Tjuta.

We stopped at a designated viewing platform for the sunrise and along with at least one hundred other people waited as the sky started to lighten up behind Uluru to the east and eventually the sun peaked up over the horizon, silhouetting Uluru in the distance while illuminating the massive domes of The Olgas, turning them from shades of gray to pink to orange and yellow and red. It was a beautiful setting to be sure; however, the sheer number of people and cameras continuously clicking and the Canadian fashionista’s complaining about the cold made it much less peaceful as it could be, though if you could block those sounds out in your head, you could just imagine what it would have been like to see this every morning without the nearby roads or viewing platforms, and the whole experience takes you to a whole new place.

The breaking sunlight on Kata Tjuta (The Olgas)

Again, we had a lot of ground to cover today, and Adam, our guide, wasted no time in getting us back onto the bus and brought us to the parking lot at the locality of Petermann. The sun was already high in the sky. Considering the throng of people at the sunrise viewing platform, there were amazingly few people here at Kata Tjuta. As much as I loved how quiet it was here, it’s really too bad that so many thousands of people come all the way out here, to the middle of this huge country to get on a bus, drive to a viewing platform, take a few photos, and hop back on their plane. I can’t lie, I also took a lot of photos, but that is never enough for me. I couldn’t come all the way out here and not have an experience, to walk through the landscape, or listen to the wind and birds, or feel the sun’s radiating heat. I wish more people desired experiences in nature. Maybe we’d all have a better appreciation for our planet and our environments and become better, more humble people.

We got off the bus and prepared for a hike through the Valley of the Winds which takes you from the parking area between some of the massive rocks that are The Olgas and into the valley protected between them. Even in August, Australia’s winter, the sun can become too intense to be outside this far in the Outback, so any hikes should start promptly in the morning. The Olgas are also incredibly sacred to the local Aboriginal communities, but curiously, outside of those communities, no one knows why. At Uluru, there are places where you cannot take photos because of spiritual significance, but there are signs explaining why the site is sacred. At Kata Tjuta, nothing is off-limits, but the whole area holds such a deep spiritual importance that only those in the Aboriginal communities can know what it is!

Down in the Valley of the Winds at Kata Tjuta

The Valley of the Winds is aptly named as air from the heating rocks rises and pulls in air from the surrounding area that gets funneled and focused in the valleys between the rocks. It’s not a difficult walk into the valley, but it is a stunning walk as you work your way between amazingly steep rock walls with massive boulders sticking out. The valley itself is made up of gently rolling rocky hills with scrubby vegetation and a few gum trees dotting it. The walk takes about three hours, provides spectacular scenery dotted with intricate flowers, and is incredibly peaceful as anyone you walk past just smiles and nods their hellos, not wanting to ruin the quiet atmosphere. Because no one knows the real significance of Kata Tjuta, there almost isn’t much else to say because there is nothing to interpret.

We finished our walk in the late morning and set up our lunch back at the bus before we packed up at set off for another long drive. We left Kata Tjuta, passed Uluru once more, and drove the hour or so back to the Curtin Springs Roadhouse for a quick break before turning off the Lasseter Highway onto Luritja Road toward Watarrka National Park, home of Kings Canyon. We stopped once more to collect firewood for that night’s dinner that was a fun, if not frustrating pit stop. The Canadian fashionista hadn’t been with us the previous day when we collected firewood and was trying to write postcards to send back home as our bus drove down the bumpy, dusty dirt road. Trying to write while driving over washboard road conditions is no easy task, and one more than one occasion, she would slam down her pen and shout something along the lines of, “I’m trying to write a postcard! Can’t the bus just stop so I can finish? This is so hard!” Complaints that received nothing but an annoyed look from me as I asked her what she expected! My postcards were barely legible because of all of the bumping around, but I thought it was part of the fun! Not only was I describing to my family what I was doing, but they could actually see it in the squiggles in my lettering! She didn’t seem to understand and got even more flustered as the bus swerved to the left and right. Once we stopped, she finally finished her postcards (though she took her time, probably not wanting to get her clothes too dirty with all the red dust) while the rest of us ventured back out into snake country to collect firewood.

A herd of feral camels in Australia

And we were in store for a treat before we left. As we loaded back onto the bus, someone spotted a little brownish-gold body bouncing between the trees and a single solitary dingo sauntered up to the bus! Frankly, I expected to see more dingoes than we did, but the curious little creature was the only one we saw and after figuring out we had nothing to offer it, he quickly sauntered away just as quickly as he came.

Further down the road, we were in for another treat as a massive herd of wild camels was socialising on the side of the road. Adam stopped our bus and we all got out, quietly stepping as close as we could to these amazing creatures without spooking them! There were dozens of them – mostly adults, but a few young ones, too and they just moved together, minding their own business. We stayed there, watching them for a while as another brilliant sunset lowered down toward the horizon. It was just such an odd sight, seeing the camels, not only because they are just funny looking animals, but because you just know they aren’t supposed to be there! The wild camel herds have naturalised so easily to the Australian Outback, their numbers can’t be culled. They’ve repopulated so well, and from such a small original stock, that people in the Middle East actually buy their camels back from Australia because the Australian camel genetics are so pure, they fetch quite a high price back in the Middle East!

The setting sun was blinding as we drove west  to Kings Canyon Resort but we eventually pulled in to our campsite for the night, got our fire up and blazing, made dinner, and set up our swags for another chilly night under brilliantly clear skies in the middle of the Outback.