Another Early Morning

Sunday (2008-09-14)

Ok, up again this morning for another sunrise photo op. Of Uluru, except this time we'll be situated on the eastern side of the Monolith so we can see the face light up with the sunrise.

An "official" sunrise viewing spot is currently under construction, so for now we pull over on the side of the road with the hundreds of other visitors who have come out this morning to experience it.

It was a morning of subtler changes as the sun rose behind us...different than the morning before. Instead of sharp contrasts and sillouttes everywhere, it was more of a softer transition from a dark landscape to one lit by the rising sun. Except for Uluru. Similar to the sunset of a couple of nights before, the Eastern face of Uluru was set ablaze in brilliant orange as the sun hit it, creating deep shadows in several spots where it's smooth skin was crevaced or sheered off.

Not everyone was up for the sunrise viewing this morning, so once we had seen what we come to see, it was back to the campsite for breakfast and break camp. This would be the only time on our trip where we'll have the luxury of two nights at a camp site.

Today, we start back to Alice Springs, but first we'll stay a night at King's Canyon.

After a couple of hours on the road, sharing stories of previous trips and adventures, we pull into our campsite, start a laundry and head off for a quick, but very refreshing swim.

Now it's off to another hike. This one, called King's Canyon Park, is 5.5km and will take us up the canyon's side and along the canyon's top finishing up with a relatively easy decent on the other side.

The climb was really quite steep - 200 meters using a staircase built into the side of the canyon...a climb which forced me to take one or two rebreather stops.

It was well worth it though as it really brought home how vast and sparse the landscape is. Miles and miles of nothing around us. The rock formation was also pretty wild in itself and provided several really cool photo ops.

Finally, there were several locations within the canyon that served as catchments and collected rain water in to massive pools. Protected from the sun, they serve as great swimming holes for the local habitat and visitors alike. Unfortunately, the areas has just been too dry recently and the water in the swimming hole too stagnant to allow swimming to be safe...but it did look pretty cool nonetheless.

We stayed on the canyon long enough to watch the sunset and then used our torches (read flashlights) to navigate our way down back to the bus and back to camp for supper and an early night...for tomorrow a group of us head back up to witness the sunrise from the top of the Canyon.

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