Our rescheduled itinerary took us thru Melbourne instead of Brisbane direct.

At Ayers Rock airport, our boarding was getting delayed by a few minutes. We were all ready to go but were kept waiting. Peeked around and realized why.

We had a physically challenged customer. In USA, most of the time they just roll you in on the aero bridge. In India, when there is no aerobridge, often instead of stairs, they use an incline (which actually folds over twice). And the customer’s wheelchair is pushed up on it.

You see that contraption on the right? That is a mobile elevator! That is what they used for our fellow passenger. I have never seen this before! Have you?

As Virgin Australia 1628 banked a hard left, I looked out of the window to take one last look at Uluru. I know it will be here for thousand of years, but for me, this is the last time I will see it. I had no idea of the existence of this even 10 years back. While researching for my one and only marathon, Outback Marathon around this rock was one of my top three choices. Eventually, went to Greece to run the Original Marathon.

But I have held a fascination for this rock ever since. Very few people I know have visited Uluru. I have asked a lot of my friends who lived or are still living in Australia. This counts the people I work with in my current company who live in Australia and New Zealand. For most, it is too far to make it worth the trip. There are the attractions of big cities and beaches that are much easier to access.

I am so happy I finally made a trip to Australia. And needless to say, made a beeline for Uluru. It was worth the wait and was even more beautiful than I thought it would be.

Would love to come back here but I know Nature has a lot more other beautiful things to offer that I should see too.

We went back to the park in the evening – this time to see Uluru by sunset. What resplendence in the richest of hues! This is a completely untouched photo – taken from my iphone. This is definitely Uluru at its beautiful best.

It was bright red off the reflection of light from the facing monolith. There were numerous birds flying in and out of the holes way up there. Sharmila had a theory that some of the bigger holes are the dens of red kangaroos. She made short shrift of my question – “How are they going to get in and out of there?” “Kangaroos can jump”, she pointed out.

I focused back on my hike down.

The sheer drop was daunting to fathom

the valley in front of us