Lots of fun things happened in March, starting with Evie’s 6th birthday party, held outdoors at Stuart Park in nearby Wollongong, NSW. She had helped decorate her cake, with its Summer and Winter theme. The games included a variant of the ancient Irish Bobbing for Apples, the ever popular Spanish Pinata, and the Aussie/British Pass The Parcel. Evie’s maternal grandparents were also able to attend – so good to be sharing a granddaughter with my dear friends Margaret and Owen!
The next fun adventure ticked a huge item on my bucket list: going to the Red Centre of Australia and seeing Uluru, the massive rock known previously to European Australians as Ayre’s Rock. There is a train from Adelaide to Alice Springs, the town in the middle of Australia, but I flew. Maybe another time I’ll take the famous Ghan through the centre. In Alice Springs, I stayed with my friends Tim and Chris Kendrick. I’ve known Chris for several years through her involvement with the NCIA Board, and NCIA family camps/retreats. Tim was a fabulous tour guide within Alice and in the surrounding region. For seeing Uluru and Kata Tjuta (another rock formation, previously known as the Olgas) I took an all-day bus tour, from 6am till 1am the next day. Certainly an experience of a lifetime!
Aussie school children all learn a verse from Dorothea Mackellar’s poem “My Country,” or at least did so during my school years. The line about Australia being a country of “ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains” kept on coming back to me. There had been “flooding rains” for many days before I got there, and all night before my bus tour. The Todd River through Alice is normally dry, but was overflowing when I was there. The MacDonnell Ranges, East and West, are the ragged backdrop to Alice Springs, visible everywhere.
Flooding prevented us from going in to a sacred “women’s cave” with its rock art, but allowed kids to swim near the rock where a small post-rain waterfall was mistaken long ago for a spring – hence the name Alice Springs. Below you can see the Todd River flowing through Alice in a spot which is normally dry for the annual boat race on foot, and also another view from Anzac Hill in the centre of town. Highlights of my tour around Alice were the Flying Doctor Service (I got to sit in a cockpit), the School of the Air, Alice Springs’ birthplace the Telegraph Station that connected Adelaide to Darwin and allowed communication with England, the original Ghan locomotive, and some wildlife at the Alice Springs Desert Park. Flies are everywhere, hence the obligatory fly masks!
Because of all the rain, the “Red Centre” was more like the “Green Centre,” which was actually a bit disappointing for me. I had been looking forward to seeing the red soil for which the Centre is famous, and I did see some of it, some with emu tracks on it (see below.) But I also witnessed the unusual blooming of the desert, and waterfalls on Uluru, which about 1% of tourists ever see. But I was not disappointed with the overpowering spiritual aspects of both Uluru and Kata Tjutu. Both are sacred to the indigenous population, and have been for around 30,000 years, or more. The creation stories associated with both of them are embedded in the majesty of the 500-million year old rock formations, such as the snake in one of the photos below. Art is a prominent feature of many sites in Uluru, both the rock art that is thousands of years old, and original art by indigenous people. The artist who painted the one I bought is pictured signing the back of it.
It was amazing to me how the wildflowers that bloom after rain can survive the arid times, and come back to life when there is enough water. A perfect image of resiliency of all kinds! I appreciated their greeting us in their simple beauty.
My final fun trip in Marvelous March was a day on Sydney Harbour, taking a ferry to Manly Beach and returning in the sunset.
Easter Sunday was the last day in March. Easter is a much bigger deal in Australia than in the USA. All the little schoolkids decorate their Easter hats, get four days off school, real Hot Cross Buns without icing are in stores for weeks ahead of time, and everyone seems to celebrate regardless of religious identity, if any. I went to the Roseville New Church on Sunday, and celebrated with Angela’s family on Easter Monday.
