Culture
Uluru, and why visitors now walk round it rather than up it
For decades, climbing Uluru was the thing to do at Australia's great red rock. Since 2019 it has been closed. The walk around its base, with its waterholes, caves and stories, turns out to be the better way to understand it.
By Walter Pellow20 October 20264 min read
Uluru rises about three hundred and fifty metres above the flat red plain of central Australia, a single great mass of sandstone, rounded and furrowed by wind and rain, its surface changing colour with the light from ochre to deep red to purple. It stands in the middle of the continent, hundreds of kilometres from the nearest town of any size, and is one of the most recognisable natural landmarks in the world. For the Anangu, the Aboriginal people of this part of the desert, it has always been something more: a place at the centre of their law, their stories and their sense of who they are.
A rock with two names
In 1873, a European surveyor, William Gosse, became the first European to reach the rock and named it Ayers Rock, after the then premier of South Australia. That name stuck for more than a century. In the decades after the Second World War, as roads, then an airstrip and motels, brought visitors to the area, the rock became a national symbol, and climbing it a rite of passage. A chain was fixed to the steepest part of the route to help climbers up.
For the Anangu, the climb was a source of distress from the beginning. The route follows the track taken by ancestral beings in the Tjukurpa, the body of law and creation stories that underpins Anangu life, and it was not a path for visitors to walk. The climb was also dangerous. It is steep, exposed and very hot in summer, and over the years dozens of people died on it, from falls and from heart attacks.
In 1985 the land was formally handed back to its traditional owners, who leased it back to the national parks service to be managed jointly as Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. The park is a World Heritage Site, listed for both its natural and its cultural importance. The Anangu had long asked visitors not to climb. In 2017, the park's board, with a majority of Anangu members, voted to close the climb for good, and it closed in October 2019.
The walk around the base, with its waterholes, caves and stories, turns out to be the better way to understand it.
Walking round instead
The full walk around the base of Uluru is about ten kilometres, flat and well marked, and it takes most people three to four hours. It is far more revealing than the view from the top. Close up, the rock turns out not to be smooth but carved by water into gullies, caves and overhangs, some decorated with ancient rock paintings. There are waterholes, such as Mutitjulu, which holds water after rain and was a vital source for people and animals. Signs explain the stories associated with each place. At certain sensitive sites, Anangu ask visitors not to take photographs, and these requests are marked.
Shorter walks, guided by rangers or by Anangu guides, explain the Tjukurpa and how people lived in the desert, and the cultural centre near the rock is an excellent place to start.
Sunrise, sunset and Kata Tjuta
The changing colours at dawn and dusk are part of the experience, and there are viewing areas for both. Thirty kilometres or so to the west, Kata Tjuta, also known as the Olgas, is a cluster of great red domes, some even taller than Uluru. The Valley of the Winds walk winds between them, and it is one of the finest walks in central Australia.
The weather matters. Summer, from December to February, is very hot, and some walks close in the late morning on the hottest days. The cooler months, from May to September, are the most comfortable. Days are warm and clear, but nights in the desert can be close to freezing. Flies can be a nuisance in the warmer months, and a fly net is not a fashion statement but a kindness to yourself.
The tours that include Uluru
Travelsphere's Highlights of Australia, twenty-one nights, includes Uluru and Alice Springs in the Red Centre. It also takes in Melbourne and Sydney, Darwin, Kakadu and Katherine in the Top End, and Cairns and Brisbane.
Just You's Australian Highlights, twenty-two nights for solo travellers, includes Uluru and Alice Springs on a route that also covers Sydney and the east coast, Cairns, Adelaide, the Barossa Valley, Hahndorf and Warrnambool.
Uluru is still as impressive as it ever was. Walking round it slowly, listening to the stories, is a way of seeing it as the people who have lived beside it for tens of thousands of years have always seen it.
By Walter Pellow, the name Atlas & Passage’s editorial team writes under. Prices and dates in the trips below come from the operators and can change.
