Remembering Tom McClendon

A colleague passed away suddenly a few days ago. Tom McClendon was someone I respected, someone I appreciated. He brought demonstrable value to our company and to my own effectiveness. His ultimate role was as Vice President/Research for the broadcasting companies. His insistence on doing things the right way rather than opting for expediency was legendary. He had, in a word, integrity.

Even as he demanded that we stay on track, stay true to our purpose, he found ways to let us know that he did so because he so wanted us to be successful. He was intense and focused, both in the workplace and on the softball fields where he coached in off-hours. He wanted to win in all endeavors, not out of arrogance, but for the sheer love of excellence in pursuit of an objective.

Tom made those around him better. He could make you feel so respected and, within minutes, bring you up short, snap you to attention and demand that you think again and sharpen your perspective on a topic. He could be fearsome in his bluntness.

He was the quintessential researcher, Tom, a man of few, but incisive, words, who let others take the spotlight and seemed happy to be the professional wind beneath their wings. Sure, he could and did make presentations to hundreds of colleagues with the utmost confidence earned through his experience and knowledge. He stepped up to the podium not because he sought attention, but because he wanted deeply to convey ideas. His need was to inform and to teach, to enlighten and open minds.

He was both a curmudgeon, quite by design, and a pussycat, a part of himself that he sometimes hid beneath the surface. On the one hand, one might say that Tom “didn’t suffer fools gladly” and that would be true. On the other hand, one could surely also say that Tom spent considerable energy as a coach, a role that often requires patience and endurance of spirit. One has only to know Tom’s wife, Lynne, to know that his bright, shiny intellect lived side-by-side with a warm humanity. He wasn’t just learned, this man, he was smart enough to win and remain married for 40 years to a smart, accomplished, and resoundingly good woman.

Personally, I will remember many kindnesses Tom showed me. I won’t forget the many times he listened carefully to my concerns, and then offered his usual rational advice. I will remember his joy when talking about his beloved Clemson Tigers. I will always smile to recall his disdain for “frou-frou” foods and his often-repeated question: “Can I just have a hamburger, please?”

Tom McClendon made a difference because he cared. We were lucky to have his guidance, fortunate that he not only loved his work, but was intensely loyal to our company. It was good to have Tom in our corner. He touched many lives and left us better for knowing him. He will be missed and he will be remembered. Rest in peace, Tom.

Musings After Down Under

We’ve been home from Down Under for two full days now, but my body clock is still wildly out of control. I went to bed last night at Midnight and woke at 3:45 this morning. Although I tried reading myself back to sleep, it didn’t work, so I got up at 5:00.

There is something wonderful about being up so early that it’s both dark and quiet outside. I watched a little TV while clearing out the dishwasher, then began wandering around the Internet. Strangely, a book that a friend recommended while we were in New Zealand is only available on Kindle in the U.S. What the heck is that about?

I continue to marvel as I recall the places we went and the experiences we had. The contrasts in landscapes and weather over the 19 days we were in New Zealand and Australia were fairly extreme. In fact we went from an arid climate to a rainy climate in one three-hour flight. Overall, it was a bit like being a human pinball.

We were on and off planes, trains, buses and boats. We walked, we climbed and some even took a ride on a camel. We saw creatures that exist nowhere else on the planet. We were exposed to an avalanche of information, including history, geography, anthropology, economy and politics, among other subjects. We also took in a fair amount of myth and fable, some of it extemporaneously composed by drivers and guides.

The trip reinforced both my love of home and my yen for travel. Going away, especially when you’re moving as much as we did from place to place, different pillows each night for our heads, is a wearing experience, however delightful. Coming home from such a mind-boggling adventure is reassuring and comfortable.

Our next big adventure is a cruise to Alaska this summer. I’m glad we have some time in our usual habitat to allow anticipation of that trip, even as we continue to absorb the images from Down Under. Finding the balance in our lives is always the key. It’s fun, though, to shake things up from time to time, then find the balance anew. Traveling is a wonderful way to do that.

The Word of the Day is WET

Sunday, April 4--It’s Easter Sunday and our final day in Australia for this trip. There is only one word for this day and that word is WET. We awoke to the sound of hard rain falling and it has not stopped raining for any length of time all day long.

Today’s plan was to eat an early breakfast on Dunk Island before departing by catamaran back to Mission Beach on the mainland. We were encouraged to “eat hearty” because our trip would not allow for lunch until 2PM. Mike and I were the first people into the breakfast area and found enough to eat to carry us through. It’s been a bit of a challenge on the island because certain dishes weren’t always ready when needed. But we survived.

There was some challenge in getting to the reception building to settle our bills because water was coursing along the walkways too deeply to pass in some places. When we left to be bussed back to the jetty, we all cut through the gift shop, umbrellas dripping and making a mess.

Packed with dripping umbrellas into the resort’s little bus, we paused carefully at the airfield to make sure the plane sitting there wasn’t about to take off. Why anyone would have wanted to take off into the cloudy mess around us is beyond me and, in fact, we passed unscathed.

We waited a few minutes under cover by the jetty for our boat, then watched as they loaded our luggage into the boat when it arrived. They had no cover for the bags, so I was glad that I wasn’t relying on having dry clothes in that bag for later. (As it turned out, when we unpacked the bag later, it was quite wet. Oh, well.)

We had a full complement in the boat and wallowed our way through the water the few miles to Mission Beach. Because of the rain, there was little ventilation and the smell of diesel was pretty stinky at first. Again, we survived, though wet and steamy. We kept a running conversation with our friends that kept us from dwelling on the less-than-ideal conditions.

Arriving in Mission Beach, we were met by our coach driver and, like the wet rats we appeared to be, we boarded the bus and left for the drive to our next and final adventure, the Skyrail to Kuranda. We actually retraced our path back through Cairns to get to Kuranda because it is north of the city and Dunk Island is to the south.

Pat and Mike and I caught shared a gondola car and began looping up over the rainforest. What a spectacular sight it is as a myriad of greens unfolds below and above us. There are two stops along the Skyrail’s route, including one to see Barron Falls. Because of the deluge of rain that’s been happening here, the Falls were roaring below us, tearing down the mountainside with fury. Our guide told us that since the river was dammed above here to generate electricity for the area, the falls mostly appear as “a trickle.” That wasn’t the case today.

Each rainforest experience we’ve had has been special. These areas are incredibly lush and literally dripping with life. It’s truly amazing to see how the trees fight for the light amid such dense foliage. Most of the really tall Kauri pines have no branches on their large trunks until the very top where they’ve risen above other trees. The palm trees support ferns, growing out like big nodes, all the way up their trunks, as we saw on Dunk Island.

At the top of the gondola ride, we were met again by the coach and deposited nearby in the village of Kuranda. We were told it started as a “hippie outpost.” Today it has a market and some tourist attractions (Butterfly House, etc.) and a market full of shops and restaurants.

We had our late lunch with the obligatory Australian meat pies. Pat had bratwurst from a little German restaurant. Desert included an Anzac biscuit (what we call a cookie), a mixture of rolled oats, flour sugar, coconut and golden syrup that mothers baked and sent to the soldiers of Australia and New Zealand when they were fighting in World War I. The biscuits are tasty, but rather hard. We decided that the soldiers could have either eaten them or used them to hurl at the enemy like Chinese throwing stars. I wouldn’t want to be hit by one.

A few souvenirs later, we were back on the bus and briefly toured through Cairns. It is an attractive city with a park along Trinity Bay which comes off the Coral Sea. It also has an enormous public swimming lagoon, created for the city’s citizens because they can’t swim in the ocean because of stinging jellyfish and can’t swim in the rivers because of crocodiles. Like much of Australia, the beauty often masks real danger.

We’re getting ready for our farewell dinner tonight and must be up before 3:00AM for an early flight. Everyone seems to agree that we’re glad we came and glad to be headed home. It will take time to process all we’ve seen and done, even to just figure out how many miles we’ve covered. There’s no question, however that the experience here will remain with us forever, its pleasures echoing through our lives. The “land down under” has left its mark on us and maybe, someday, we’ll come again to see, as they say often here, “how it goes.”

Ah, Paradise--the Great Barrier Reef

Saturday, April 3--We woke this Saturday morning on Dunk Island to clouds, but the sun had begun to show itself by the time we finished breakfast. Mike and I took a few minutes in the gift shop, then back to our room to get ready for today’s adventure to the Great Barrier Reef.

We had a short drive to the jetty to catch the boat. Today’s catamaran was larger than yesterday and brought some folks from Mission Beach to meet up with those from Dunk to head out to the Reef. We still had fewer people than the boat often takes, so were able to spread out and not feel crowded. Our trip was a bit rough crossing the deeper waters as we went 18 miles out to anchor near a small sandy cay along the Reef. One of our group got motion sickness and spent the remainder of the trip recuperating.

With lots of assistance and instruction we began going into the water with our snorkeling gear. The water was a very refreshing temperature, but I found it to be more challenging than I’d hoped, so got farther from the boat than I should have done. I made it back okay, but I was really exhausted by the effort it took. Big sister Pat was there at the ladder when I returned to the boat and helped me out of my flippers and up to get onboard. Our guide who has been here many times verified that the waters were daunting today, the current stronger than occurs sometimes.

We had a pretty day and the boat itself was air conditioned on one level and relaxing. A simple, but adequate lunch was provided. The disappointments mounted when the dinghy that had been promised to take folks back and forth to the little cay where we could have snorkeled in shallower water failed to work. They had brought along two motors for backup, but neither could be made to work. Apparently there was water in the fuel or something.

A worse disappointment for those in our party who hadn’t planned to swim was the lack of a glass-bottom boat, another promise of this Reef tour. Apparently the contracted company had a breakdown on their glass-bottom boat and another was not available. Needless to say, this was a very big disappointment to several of our fellow travelers. As we’ve grown fond of them, we felt bad for their inability to enjoy the reef as they had hoped.

These let-downs probably caused the most disgruntlement on this entire trip. Other problems have been weather-related and, while disappointing, we understood the need to make changes to adapt around them. Today’s issues seemed, instead, to be a failure of service from this provider that shouldn’t go without notice. We’re all filling out questionnaires about the tour tonight and tomorrow and I’m confident the comments there will cover today’s failings.

We continue to marvel at the beauty of this island and its rainforest. Flowers are both colorful and fragrant. The trees are lush with most palm trunks supporting big ferns. The beaches are sandy and welcome visitors to stroll along them. They don’t, Pat reminds us, have the exceptionally fine white sand that line the Gulf of Mexico in Florida, but they serve their purpose. The resort provides shallow bowls in which to dip and wash your feet after a walk on the sand.

The humidity is so high that even when it isn’t raining, our skin feels damp and it’s difficult to dry towels or clothing when it gets wet. This is the price paid for such green surroundings where everything grows quickly and lavishly.

Having the island days at this point in the tour was planned to allow for rest. It has been in some ways the opportunity to relax that we needed. Tomorrow’s tour on the way back to Cairns will, we hope, be easy on us as we prepare for the very long flying trek that will get us back to Charlotte through Sydney, Los Angeles and Dallas.

Photos by Mike Lumpkin

Cairns to Dunk Island

Friday, April 2--Cairns sits on Trinity Bay, so named by Captain Cook when he came this way because he arrived here on Trinity Sunday. His log indicates that he thought it was a place just for “mosquitoes and crocodiles” and he left. He found the Great Barrier Reef off the coast by, as our driver Chris said, by “running into it.” There are, Chris said, crocodiles in the rivers and creeks, despite the fact that this is now a fast-growing metropolitan area of about 132,000 people.

Sugar cane and tourism are the major sources of income here, although the cane fields are being sold off for housing developments. As the area attracts more “holiday-goers,” its growth will bring more change.

On our drive down a highway that goes all the way to Brisbane, about 1200 miles south, runs in a sea of green. The sugar cane and greenery in the lowlands are almost glowing, seeming to be lit from within, perhaps containing sunshine that’s actually pretty scarce around here. The trees and foliage growing thickly on the mountain slopes is darker. Along the roadside blooming plants have flowers in yellows, purples, pinks, reds and whites. The plants without blooms are colorful, too, with leaves of green, yellow and red.

We pass two Sikh Temples along our route. As we come by a mountain called Walsh’s Pyramid, over 900 metres high, we’re told there’s an annual footrace there that’s been going on for more than 50 years and runners get up and down it in a record hour and 20 minutes or so. It’s very steep, so the prospect of such a run is daunting.

As we pass fields of banana trees, we’re told that the bags surrounding the banana bunches are there to protect them from birds, but also to help the bananas maintain a uniform size. It looks rather labor-intensive. Our driver asks if we think bananas are fruits. We answer yes. He says no, it’s an herb. Who knew? Mangoes are also grown here, having been brought in from India, and pineapples are grown west of here. This is an area of heavy rainfall and much is successfully farmed.

I’m fascinated by the place names that are such a wonderful mix of heritage and language. We pass signs for Aloomba, Gordonvale, Babinda, Dinner Creek, Innisfail, Millaa Millaa, Ingham and Miriwinni. Millaa, we hear, is the aboriginal word for water. Used twice, it means lots of water. That certainly fits in a region that has at least 100 inches of water each year.

There is no clay here to make brick, so homes are built of timber or concrete block. Many are raised up in this wet climate where sudden hard rains can create flooding. In 2006 Cyclone Larry, a Category 5 storm, blew through here, smashing the cane and banana fields, damaging the roads and blowing the tin roofs off houses. Only now, four years later, has the residual damage from that event disappeared from view.

Signs refer to this as the Cassowary Coast. The cassowary (from New Guinea dialect kasu-weri, meaning horn-headed) is a large flightless bird that lives in the rainforest and is quite dangerous. In addition to its colorful plumage and the horn on its head, it has a very sharp claw that can disembowel a human being. [Ah, yes, it’s another of Australia’s deadly creatures.]

There are now only 1300 of these left in all Australia, making it a somewhat endangered species. Predators are primarily feral animals (dogs, cats and pigs) who mostly steal the bird’s eggs, but the deadliest predator is man, specifically humans in vehicles. Alongside the road in one area we see a huge sign with silhouettes of a car and a cassowary with the words “Speeding Has Killed Cassowaries.”

We pass a winery named Murdering Point. When I asked about the name, the driver said it probably referred to earliest times when whites and Aborigines were not friendly and, in fact, white people shot aboriginal people with impunity.

We turn off the main highway to go to Mission Beach, a village where we’ll catch the ferry to Dunk Island, our home for the next two nights. The ferry is a catamaran and we all choose to sit out on the front deck as we cross a relatively calm sea. It’s cloudy and pleasant and wonderful to hear only the thrum of the engines and the wind in my ears. Ahead of us are several islands and we make our way to ours in about half an hour.

Arriving on Dunk Island, we’re greeted by the resort staff and bused the short distance to the hotel area itself. We discover it’s both a national park and a family resort with an abundance of children running around this Easter holiday. Mike and Pat and I get checked into our beachside rooms and walk back to the jetty where we arrived to get some lunch at the café there.

Walking through the rainforest even a short distance is a reminder that wet climates enjoy the presence of mosquitoes. I quickly take advantage of the small shop next door to buy a small bright green can “Bushman Plus.” This miracle spray (also a sunscreen) professes to repel not just mosquitoes, but also sandflies, flies, ticks AND leeches! We’re glad to use it to ward of the current pests and sincerely hoping not to need it for leeches.

Mike and I use the beach route back to our room, just wading at the edge of the water. The brochure in our room that’s entitled “Jellyfish—An Informative Guide” assures us that none of the awful stinging box jellyfish is seen here regularly, but they do provide the brochure and throughout the property there are vinegar stations along the shore. Vinegar is the best immediate treatment for those who are stung. Needless to say, swimming in the pool seems a much better option than risking swimming where any stinging jellyfish might be.

We’re told there are no poisonous snakes on the island, but there are snakes. Apparently these are harmless pythons, etc. Now, for someone with my snake phobia, the use of the word harmless next to python is simply pointless--especially when they also say that the non-poisonous snakes might bite you if you frighten them. I have no wish to frighten them and hope they will feel the same about me, meaning they won’t come where I can see them.

We came back, got into our “swimming costumes,” as our guide Leigh calls them, but opted for a quick nap instead. We slept for hours, maybe because there have been too many late nights and early mornings and all these days of coaches, airplanes, walks and talks, cities and towns, mountains and valleys.

We awoke to Pat’s knocking on the door telling us that we’re 15 minutes from dinner, so we quickly roused ourselves, got presentable at best and headed for yet another buffet with our group. We enjoyed our table of friends, although we had to move when the rain came down again and blew into the restaurant which is sort of like a high tent.

After dinner, Mike and I went into the lounge and tried a local rum, Bundaberg, made by the same folks who make sugar from those cane fields. It’s a dark and overly sweet rum, by our tastes, but we like to try things. Some of our tour mates came in and we had a wide-ranging conversation when we could hear each other over the sound of the guitarist who played and sang tonight.

When they took the candle from our table and turned on the overhead lights, we had been there through a couple of different hard rains, but were able to walk back to our room through a soft mist. As I’ve written this, I’ve heard the rain intensify at least twice. We’re scheduled to go out to the Great Barrier Reef for snorkeling tomorrow and they say we’ll go, rain or shine. Now it’s time for sleep, perfect with the sound of rain all around.

Photos by Mike Lumpkin

From the Dry Red Centre to the Wet Green Coastal Rainforest

This Thursday, we get to sleep in just a bit more than usual. After breakfast, we’re off by coach to see Kata Tjuta, with its 36 domes rising off the rippling sand dunes high into the air in sight of Uluru. The road winds a long way, about twice as far by road as the distance straight across the land.

A primary reason for the longer route is to avoid sacred areas as designated by the Aborigines who are the traditional owners of this land. Our driver gave us some information about the Aborigines. Until recent times they were considered wild animals here and could be shot without recrimination.

During that time, an effort was made by the government to “break the culture” of the aborigines. The government took aboriginal children away from their parents and resettled them with foster parents or orphanages operated by the churches. The children were randomly placed with the idea that they would “be better off.” Some received an education and were assimilated into the general population. Some were less fortunate and were treated as slaves by their foster parents. In all cases, they felt the grief of leaving their own families behind, some never to see them again.

Our guide spotted another Thorny Devil on the road and brought in aboard the coach. This one was a bit bigger than yesterday’s find and we kept him with us until we got to Kata Tjuta and released him.

There is a path with a slight rise into Walpa Gorge among the domes. Some of us made it just part of the way in and others hiked all the way in, about a 25-minute walk. There’s a wonderful breeze that flows through the Gorge, but it wasn’t enough today to keep away the flies. They are small and persistent and I was very grateful for the fly net.

While visiting white women are allowed to go into the Gorge along with men, aboriginal women are not allowed to go beyond the shelter at the edge of the road. This is considered a sacred men’s business area. It’s yet another interesting traditional belief that has been adjusted for non-aboriginals.

We stopped for photos and restrooms. The signage typically refers bluntly to the available of toilets, but they’re commonly referred to out here as dunnies. The women’s room was in temporary quarters in a metal building like we use at golf tournaments, something they call a donger. So as I stepped into the donger in search of the dunny, I saw a sign saying “Don’t feed the dingoes.” I realized  that this was an experience I’d never imagined having nor would be likely to have again soon.

This is the area in which the Australian woman lost her baby and said the dingoes took it.  Our driver said his uncle went to her trial when she was accused of killing the baby herself.  The uncle saw her as "acting guilty," but she was acquitted.  A memorable phrase from the movie--"maybe the dingo ate your baby"--echoed in my mind here.

Because this is a World Heritage area, we’re not allowed to pick up rocks or sand. There are heavy fines for removal of anything that belongs here. There’s a “Sorry Book” at the Cultural Centre with stories from people who actually did take away items and weren’t caught and punished by the authorities, but have since written letters about the bad luck they had as long as they kept those things.

These formations look as soft as velvet until you get really close to them. As you approach nearer, it looks somewhat like a giant red cement sculpture. Uluru itself is pocked with caves of many sizes and depths.

We went from Kata Tjuta to the Mutitjula waterhole at the base of Uluru. Our driver walked us back to the waterhole along a path that included a stop in one of the caves used by aboriginals. There are paintings there that he described as something of a signboard. One painting might cover another as events occurred and were recorded in this way. He told the story of the first white man seen by the people here, a white man who arrived on a camel, it being the first of those ever seen. What a moment that must have been!

The Cultural Centre was created in 1985 when this area was turned over to them. The Aborigines, a culture without buildings, sat together with architects to design this place. The entrance represents Kuniya, the good snake of legend who lived at Ulura. You exit through the poisonous snake, Liru. that once lived at Kata Tjuta. As a sort of aboriginal joke, the “bad things” are in the bad snake, so that’s where they take visitors’ money for souvenirs and snacks. It’s a good place to get a better idea about aboriginal ways and what this area means to the local Aborigines.

Our flight left from the local airfield in mid-afternoon taking us across country to Cairns on the Northeast Coast. We were able to see the very green landscape below us when we came below a heavy cloud cover. It was dark by the time we got our bags and got on the bus, dark and raining. It rains in Cairns a lot and it is quite tropical, lying only 12 degrees below the Equator.

We checked in to the hotel, had supper in one of the string of restaurants along the marina behind our hotel and packed up for tomorrow’s trip to Dunk Island. We’ll leave our big suitcases here, taking only bathing suits and a change of clothes for our two days and nights there. We expect to share the resort with lots of people because their Easter holiday began this evening. Most Australians now have at least 5 days off through Tuesday and many take extra days for a long break. It’s common here for folks to have at least four weeks of vacation each year!

We’ve had so many different experiences on this trip and tomorrow’s boat trip adds another. I’ve come to understand that it’s perhaps past time to go home, but I’m looking forward to relaxing and seeing the Great Barrier Reef before we leave Monday morning for the long trek back to Charlotte.

Photos by Mike Lumpkin

Alice Springs to Ayers Rock (Uluru)

Wednesday in Central Australia and our objective today was to get to Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock) from Alice Springs. First off, we noted the iron light poles on the roads here. They had to use iron because the termites would eat wooden poles.

Just next to our hotel is the casino which is right across the road from the dry riverbed where the Aborigines like to rest in the shade of the trees there. Our guide told us that the casino originally had a petting zoo just outside its doors with kangaroos and wallabies. The aboriginals, whose traditions exemplify the “no worries” lifestyle, dealing only with today’s needs, saw the enclosure as their local butcher and would climb the fence, hit a roo on the head and go cook it up. The casino replenished the enclosure a few times, then gave it up.

It is at least a five-hour drive through Central Australia, also known as the Red Centre. Australians refer to “the bush” as open areas that include greenery. Out here, bushes are exactly what you see. Even the trees appear mostly to be bushes because, in some cases their trunks are below ground, so all we see is the tree tops.

Most of what we’re seeing are mulga bushes, a type of acacia, but there are a couple of other shrubs. Trees are mostly the coolibah and the desert oak. You might remember the coolibah from “Waltzing Matilda.” The desert oak is not really an oak, but is a casuarina. We often find these misnomers here.

We pulled in at a camel farm for our morning tea. Camels were brought to Australia from the Canary Islands and used in trains to move goods up through this desolate country. Once the railway came, there was no longer a use for the camels and they were released into the wild. Now our driver, Colin, says there are a million feral camels in Australia. They can subsist on the vegetation here and because the open country is so huge, they can actually hide from occasional attempts to diminish their numbers.

Nowadays, the managers of the giant cattle stations out here have found a new revenue stream in rounding up and selling the camels. In those countries where camels originated, they no longer have wild stock, so they are buying camels from Australia to keep up their herds. The Aussies are also making a few dollars selling camel meat—word is that it has no cholesterol so is healthier than beef. That’s a little hard to swallow when we’ve just taken pictures of our friends riding camels.

Driving on through the vast expanse of this country, we pass few other vehicles and more dry riverbeds. On this road signs are posted encouraging drivers to stop occasionally to avoid accidents caused by drivers falling asleep due to the monotony. In order to relieve any potential boredom among the passengers, our driver and guide alternate in telling us stories about the countryside and Australian oddities. One quick tongue-in-cheek question: what do you call a dead kangaroo by the side of the road? Answer: a was-a-roo.

The driver also keeps handy and plays Australian folk music for us. As he points out, almost all the songs have something to do with drinking beer. When he played “Waltzing Matilda” for us translated the story into something much less cheerful than it sounds. Apparently, the swagman ends up being hanged for thievery and dancing at the end of the trooper’s rope. Not what I’d ever imagined the story might be.

Mt. Connor appears on the horizon when we’re about 90 minutes from Uluru. When I ask if that’s Uluru, the driver says no, but it’s often referred to as “Fooluru” because people think they’re seeing Uluru. Mt. Connor, however, is shaped somewhat like Uluru when seen from a distance, but is on private land and not part of the Uluru National Park. Uluru itself belongs to the Aborigines and is includes some of their holy places.

When we stop to take photos of Mt. Connor, a short walk up the red sand dunes on the other side of the road reveals Lake Amadeus, a huge salt lake, usually visible as a dry salty crust when there is no rain. Our driver offered a lengthy amount of information about the history of this area, but I’ll not attempt to include all the blah-blah here.

Our driver made a sudden stop because as we traveled along the road at about 55 mph he had spotted a Thorny Devil (lizard). He backed the coach up and pulled off to the side, opened the door and said “I’ll just get him and be right back.” Sure enough, he returned moments later with a gold and brown mottled lizard about 7 inches long. This little guy lives up to his name with little “thorns” all over him. He allowed us to hold him. While he was a bit jumpy at first, he calmed and seemed to relax as flashes went off and other hands reached for him. After a few minutes of this unexpected nature experience, Mr. Thorny was released into the roadside to search for the tiny ants he eats.

As we come closer to Uluru, we see how the light and the clouds overhead change the rock’s appearance. Most photos show it as red, but clouds moving overhead create a rapidly changing myriad of designs, much like looking through a kaleidoscope. The clouds themselves float like cotton puffs through the bright blue sky and, because it’s relatively flat out here, it feels like one of those movies in the round where you are conscious of something to see all around you.

Now, too, we could see Kata Tjuta, formerly known as The Olgas. There are 36 of these vertical columns about 15 miles from Uluru. Seen together on the horizon these rock formations are worthy of awe. We took a brief drive around Uluru this afternoon, but will go back for a walk around the base and go to Kata Tjuta tomorrow.

Uluru is a place of holy meaning to the Aborigines, although only parts of it are considered. Their legends about the rock include both fanciful and imaginative explanations for the various features visible there, including lichen and erosion formations. One big formation looks very much like an Aborigine and is said to be one of their wise men.

We’re staying in a low-rise, sprawling hotel called Sails in the Desert. The roofline has sails along it. The buildings surround a courtyard with green grass, a swimming pool and beautiful landscaping. When we got to our room we found that we have a large terrace/balcony with flowers all around it—a great place to have a glass of wine in the cool of the evening after the flies go to sleep.

Capping the day off was what is called the Sounds of Silence dinner. We were picked up from our hotel and taken out to a place where we were first treated to champagne and canapés. In addition, the first part of the evening contained didgeridoo music. The musician welcomed us and shared his personal story, explaining both the instrument and his heritage in the process.

He called it the Yidaki and explained how it’s made with the help of termites to eat out the inside of the eucalyptus trunk, as well as fire to smooth and seal the ends. He said he was the child of a Caucasian mother and Aborigine father and had been playing the Yidaki for 11 years. Looking a bit like Russell Crowe, he had the women enthralled with his story.

He also repeated a story we’d heard earlier today about the word “kangaroo.” Apparently when the first English in Australia met the Aborigines, they pointed at the marsupials and asked what to call the animals they had never seen before. Because the two cultures didn’t share a language, the Aborigines answered with “kangaroo.” That means “I do not understand your question.” The English took kangaroo to be the name of the animal and so it has remained.

Then we were escorted down the hill to the dinner area, replete with tables for ten with tablecloths and silver and a truly fabulous buffet that included Australian dishes like kangaroo, barramundi (a local fish) lamb and crocodile Caesar salad. Plied with local wines throughout the meal, we were also treated to a star talk with a different take than our experience in Alice Springs last night.

It was a beautiful night with a full moon above and the stars all around. We watched the sun set near Kata Tjuta and the moon rise beside Uluru. As one of our tour friends and tablemates said, “Here we are in the Outback, having dinner under the stars. What could be better than this?”

Surely there are many experiences that are yet to please us, but none that will better this night under these stars with companions from around the world who have come here and shared this time. Memories are made of this.

Photos by Mike Lumpkin