OUTBACK AUSTRALIA PHOTO JOURNAL DAY 2: BIKING ULURU

The harsh ring of my alarm at 430 am let me know that it was time for another adventure. I’ve slept a total of 10 hours over the last three nights but I had no trouble rallying as I had been waking up for sunrise adventures of a lifetime.

Over the past day and a half in Yulara, the town built around Uluru, we had viewed the rock from multiple sites, lookouts and even from the back of a camel. However, this morning we were got up close and personal with Uluru.

We cruised into the base of Uluru and I was immediately taken aback by the sheer drop of the smooth red walls. It’s a sight every Aussie kid has seen in books and on television their whole life. But it took being within arms reach of the red rock to understand the scale.

It was all smiles as we hung out while the sun rose in the distance. It wasn’t necessarily a sunrise spot per say where you would shoot into the sun or get a classic shot but when you hang out with a bunch of talented photographers and people with visually creative minds you create some unique shots. Add in my restlessness and desire to have some adrenaline at six in the morning and I found myself sliding down the catwalk to Uluru as the guys got the shot.

After our sunrise chill session at the base, we headed to the other side of the rock and picked up a few cruiser bikes. Uluru is about 15km to walk around so hiring a bike is definitely the go. This way you can cruise around the whole rock without dying in the Aussie outback sun.

The beauty of a bike cruise like this is that you get a chance to not only enjoy the enormity of the rock but also introduce yourself to some of the Aboriginal Dreamtime stories about how the rock was formed an what it means to them. It is an incredibly sacred site and many of the caves and boulders are so important to the Aboriginal culture that photos are not allowed. There are plenty of photographic opportunities that are encouraged but there are signs in certain sensitive areas, which request you to enjoy and experience but not photograph. As you can see I shot plenty of images so you will have no trouble capturing your memories.

We rushed back to the hotel, smashed breakfast and then hit the road. Our next destination was Kings Canyon. The isolation of our journey hits you at certain moments and our arrival at the Kaarke Indigenous Cultural Tour. We pulled into an empty parking lot, essentially in the middle of nowhere. We were in the outback for real.

Christine and Elma from Kaarke spent the next hour leading us through their traditional practices for cooking, hunting, artistry, and medicine. It was a short introduction to the unbelievable knowledge that has been passed down for generations dating back thousands of years.

Tomorrow is a day full of adventures with a sunrise hike in Kings Canyon after waking up at 4 am followed by an adventure to an outback waterhole.

I’m with a few talented Aussie photographers on this trip and you can check them out at the links below. They are creating some epic shots for the tourism board and have some really unique styles and approaches to content creation.

I am stoked to be on this trip of a lifetime in collaboration with Northern Territory Tourism Board and the awesome crew at We Are Explorers