Nothing can prepare you for the sight of Uluru, a 150-million-year-old monolith that emerges surreally from the desert flatlands in Australia's Red Centre.
Joanna Wane falls under the spell of this ridiculously magnificent hunk of rock.
In the creation time, two powerful snakes duked it out at the base of Uluru. A carpet python, Minymas Kuniya, came from the east to the aid of her nephew and defeated Wati Liru, a poisonous King Brown from the west. Her spirit combined with her nephew’s to become Wanampi, the water snake that still lives by the Kapi Mutitjulu waterhole today, protecting and controlling the desert’s most precious resource.
There’s much more to that story, which belongs to Anangu, the Western Desert’s Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara people. But if you want to hear the rest of it, you’ll just have to get on a plane and go to Uluru yourself.
The red sandstone of Uluru, a desert monolith thought to be 150 million years old. Photo / Joanna Wane
Since the Australian Government officially handed back Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in the 1980s, special protocols have been developed to acknowledge Anangu’s cultural intellectual property (IP) rights, in recognition of the area’s great spiritual significance.
Restricting commercial access to sacred and sensitive sites, it’s also given the traditional custodians control over who tells their stories and how, after decades of seeing their “tjukurpa” — a concept that has parallels with tikanga and te ao Māori — being commodified for profit. Gone are the bad old days when a marketing campaign could morph Ayers Rock (Uluru) into a Big Mac and the Olgas (Kata Tjuta) into French fries.
Michelle, an interpreter for Maruku Arts, with some of the vibrant red quandong berries that are among the bush food to be found on the Kuniya Walk, at the base of Uluru. Photo / Joanna Wane
Distinct from the Red Centre’s dreamtime stories, which you’ll hear up north in Alice Springs, these are creation stories, passed down from generation to generation and held by specific communities.
“Their belief is this really did happen. It’s real life. It’s real story,” says Michelle, an interpreter for Maruku Arts, which runs a guided tour in the Pitjantjatjara language along the Kuniya Walk to Kapi Mutitjulu waterhole, folded into the rock on the south side of Uluru. “If something moves or changes, anything where the white fella would have a technical way of thinking, Anangu always bring it back to the spirits or ancestral beings. Everything changes because of the spirits.”
It’s springtime and Uluru hasn’t had any rain for two months, but there’s plenty of bush food ripening alongside the path: bright-red quandong fruit — their kernels are used to make jewellery, including the bracelet I’d bought the day before — and yellowish desert raisins that taste like banana.
Kapi Mutitjulu waterhole, at the base of Uluru. Photo / Joanna Wane
We pass the burial place where the skull of a Pitjantjatjara man was returned to Uluru late last year, after being repatriated from the South Australian Museum. Anangu have never lived at Uluru or Kata Tjuta, the towering cluster of rock formations 55km to the west, but both were important sites for ceremony. Rock art on the first of three caves we pass on the Kuniya Walk was used to teach boys the skills required to become a wati (an initiated man) and remains off-limits to women and younger children.
The waterhole itself has a tranquil beauty. Despite the recent lack of rain, a pool of cool, clear water is cupped in red sandstone, steadily holding its ground beneath the cloudless blue sky.
Uluru at sunrise. Photo / Joanna Wane
Nothing can prepare you for the sight of Uluru itself, a 150-million-year-old monolith that emerges surreally from the desert flatlands like something out of a Wes Anderson movie set. If you’ve seen his latest film, Asteroid City, you’ll know what I mean.
I couldn’t take my eyes off this ridiculously magnificent hunk of rock, from the moment I first spotted it through the car window after a five-hour drive from Alice Springs to my last glimpse from the plane window as we flew out (if you’re heading to Sydney, make sure you sit on the right-hand side of the plane).
A spectacular one-hour scenic helicopter flight sweeps over Uluru and then on to the domed rock formations of Kata Tjuta and the white salt crust of Lake Amadeus, which stretches for 180km. Photo / Joanna Wane
I saw it emerging from the horizon at sunrise, after wandering through the Field of Light installation, where 50,000 solar-powered stems of coloured lights create a mass of glowing desert flowers as far as the eye can see.
I saw it from the air, on an hour-long helicopter flight that swept west to Kata Tjuta, where I discovered that what looks like a single jelly mound is actually 36 separate domes, with enough space to march an army between them. Over Lake Amadeus, a massive salt lake that stretches for 180km, wild camel tracks were visible trailing across the crystalised surface. A dot painting in white salt.
Bill Blair, chief drone pilot for the Wintjiri Wiru sound and light show, which uses the desert as a backdrop, with Uluru visible on the horizon. Photo / Joanna Wane
And I saw it dissolve into shadow at sunset, the sky streaked with ochre, and watched as the desert became a canvas for Wintijri Wiru, the extraordinary new sound and light show that uses lasers and 1200 choreographed drones to tell a chapter of the ancient Mala creation story — with Uluru standing guardian on the horizon.
Permission for use of the story was gifted by Anangu, who have lived in the Red Centre for some 60,000 years: “This story is still here and will be forever. As you travel home, take this with you and share it with your people. This way, we will always be connected.”
Hundreds of choreographed drones create Kurpany the devil dog in the sky as part of Wintjiri Wiru, with Uluru as the backdrop. Photo by Getty Images for Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia. Acknowledgement: Anangu share the Mala story, from Kaltukatjara to Uluru, through a drone, sound and light show designed and produced by RAMUS.
Checklist
Uluru
GETTING THERE
Air NZ, Qantas, Jetstar and AirAsia all fly direct from Auckland to Sydney International Airport. From there, a domestic flight to Uluru takes two and a half hours. Accommodation options at Voyages Ayers Rock Resort range from a campground to apartments to the five-star Sails in the Desert.
Acknowledgement: As custodians of the land, Anangu hold the Mala story from Kaltukatjara to Uluru. To share their story, RAMUS designed and produced an artistic platform using drones, light and sound to create an immersive storytelling experience.
