THE MOTHER OF ALL ROCKS
No matter how much travelling you've done, approaching Uluru (Ayers Rock) for the first time is a mind blowing experience. It's hard to tell how big the thing is until you're right there, such a weird shape breaking out of a flat desert floor. And on top of all that, Uluru constantly changes colour depending on what the weather is doing and the time of day. Amazing stuff.
MORE THAN 40 METRES TALLER THAN THE SYDNEY TOWER
Uluru rises 348 metres above the desert with a circumference of 9.4km which is more than 40 meters taller than the Sydney Tower and with considerably more girth!! It measures 3.6 km long and 2.4 km wide oriented in an east-west direction. There is more of Uluru under the ground than above it which, when you're standing beside it, really brings home what a huge chunk of rock it is. Formed in Cambrian times (very long time ago), Uluru has been folded and tilted around so that all the layers formed are tilted at 90°, which is why it has those cool flowing vertical bands.
COLOUR IS ONLY SKIN DEEP
Although Uluru appears red, it is actually made from a kind of sandstone called arkose which is mainly grey and white. The red colour comes from a thin coating of iron oxide which permeates most of Central Australia. When it comes to the changing colours at sunset, it is actually the light refracting as it gets lower in the sky causing blue light to bend away. This leaves the red light to accentuate the existing red colour of the rock. I'll drink to that!!
ANYONE TO MOUNT OLGA?
In what seems a bizarre occurrence, only about 30km west of Uluru stands an equally amazing rock formation in the form of 36 domes that form Kata Tjuta (the Olgas). The highest of these domes is called Mount Olga which stands even higher than Uluru at over 500 metres. These two block busters of the Red Centre are part of the Uluru Kata Tjuta National Park, which encompass 132,566 hectares, and which is a World Heritage listed area.
