ULURU

 

Wiki commons

Uluru is a large sandstone monolith located near the center of Australia. It is the world's largest single rock. Its stats:

500 million years old; 2.2 miles long, 1.2 miles wide, 5.8 miles around base, extends an estimated 1.5 miles into the ground. It rises 1141 feet about the surrounding area, 2831 feet above sea level.

Its mass attracts thunderstorms and the resulting rainfall creates a unique ecosystem around the rock.

Humans have been in Australia for 50,000-65,000 years. It has been estimated that they have lived in the area for 10,000. Uluru holds great cultural significance for the Aṉangu people, the traditional inhabitants of the area. Their creation story holds that Earth began as a flat, featureless place and out of the earth arose beings with the ability to move between human and animal form. As they traveled through the world, they created everything we see today. This period of creation is called by the Aṉangu as "the time of dreaming" and they believe that their land is still inhabited by the spirits of dozens of these ancestral creator beings.

Europeans first sighted Uluru in 1873 during a surveying mission and was named Ayers rock in in honor of the Chief Secretary of South Australia Sir Henry Ayers. In 1985, the Australian government returned ownership of Uluru to the local people, with a condition that the Aṉangu would lease it back to the National Parks and Wildlife agency for 99 years and that it would be jointly managed. In 1993, the government agreed to a dual name Ayers Rock/Uluru but reversed the order in 2002 to Uluru/Ayers Rock. Uluru became a UNESCO world heritage site in 1987.