July 19: Uluru / Ayers Rock

On this date in 1873 Botanist and explorer William Gosse became the first European to discover Ayers Rock (Uluru). He named it in honour of South Australian Premier Sir Henry Ayers. Today it is officially known as "Uluru / Ayers Rock".

1. Where is it? In the middle of Australia, in the Northern Territory, 450km from the nearest town, Alice Springs.
2. How big is it? About 3.6kms long and 1.9kms wide, with a circumference of 9.4kms. The walk around the base is 10km and takes about three and a half hours to complete. Uluru is 348 metres above sea level at its tallest point (24m higher than the Eiffel Tower).
3. It's like an Iceberg - the majority of it - 2.5kms of its bulk - is underground.
4. Uluru is estimated to be around 600 million years old, and was originally under the sea.
5. Its orange Red colour is caused by surface oxidation of its Iron content.
6. The word Uluru doesn't actually mean anything in the Aboriginal language. It's purely and simply a name. It is also the family name of the senior Traditional Owners of Uluru.
7. There are a few creation myths about how Uluru came to be. One says it was built by two boys in the mud after the rain. When they'd finished, they went to the table topped Mount Conner where their bodies were turned into boulders. Another says it was the earth's reaction to a war between ancestral spirits.
8. Uluru was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.
9. It is to this day a sacred site for the native Aborigines, particularly the local Anangu tribe. It's not illegal to climb Uluru at time of writing (though a ban is set to come into force in October 2019) but doing so is considered disrespectful to the Aboriginal culture. It's also dangerous - 37 people have died in the attempt. Some believe there's a curse, not only on people who try to climb but on those who take rocks away as souvenirs. Many people who have done so try to post them back later after experiencing a run of bad luck.
10. Visitors are also asked not to photograph certain parts of Uluru because there male or female only rituals take place there and people of the opposite sex are not allowed to see them. There is a danger that people who aren't supposed to see the sites might inadvertently violate the taboo by stumbling upon tourist's pictures on the internet.

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