Uluru, Australia

Touching down for the first time in Australia, as soon as we stepped onto the tarmac, we knew we we’re going to be in for a real treat. With a single terminal airport and not another city for hundreds of miles, we were excited and a bit anxious to start our 4 day camping trip in the Australian Outback.

Over the next few days, we spent most of our waking hours watching the sun rise and hiking different rock formations in Uluru–Kata Tjuta National Park. This national park is most known for the large red rock—Uluru or Ayers Rock— which is considered the world’s largest monolith and is over 600 million years old. To this day, it is still considered a holy site by the aboriginal tribes that still inhabit the area. Each rock formation was absolutely beautiful and we had a great time with our 22 other campers learning about the history and geology of the national park. Most of our days ended watching the sunset on the great red rock and other mountainous places in the outback, watching as sun turned the sky a different color each night.

What happened after the sun set behind Uluru, dare we say, was more beautiful than the sunset itself. With the cotton candy skies fading, millions of stars start to emerge. With all of the light pollution that we have back in the states, it’s easy to forget how beautiful a night sky can be. As we set up our swags (a canvas like sleeping bag) out under the stars, we couldn’t help but feel unbelievably small in such a big world. Falling asleep watching shooting stars fly by became our new norm, and it’s an experience we will never forget.

Interesting facts:

WOW can it get chilly at night. Sleeping outside in sub 40 degree had us wearing almost every article of clothing we packed (insert Joey Tribbiani: Could I be wearing any more clothes?! meme).
Quick Uluru facts: 1,141 feet tall, 2 miles long and 1 mile wide. Amazingly, most of the rock sits underground.