Author: Charles River Editors
Narrator: David Bernard
Unabridged: 1 hr 50 min
Format: Digital Audiobook
Publisher: Findaway Voices
Published: 09/17/2019
The magnificent monolith the locals call “Uluru,” situated in the heart of Australia, hovers over a patchy bed of desert poplars and spinifex grasslands. The pleasant, but otherwise unexceptional surroundings of the spellbinding sandstone landform only further accentuates its majesty, one that can be appreciated from a variety of angles. To lime-colored budgerigars, mighty brown falcons, passengers in planes and helicopters, and other creatures blessed with the gift of flight, the free-form rock is reminiscent of the fossil of a spiky fish, a misshapen arrowhead, or perhaps a peculiar, ocher-tinged seashell peeking out of the sand. To those gazing upon the natural gem on solid ground, the flat-topped, burnt sienna beauty, marked with character-forming dimples, ripples, and ridges, looks more like a sleeping, thousand-year-old turtle, particularly through squinted eyes.
Its striking appearance aside, Uluru, also known as “Ayers Rock,” is far more than an unmissable landmark. Uluru represents an inimitable symbol of life and culture, and a place of worship sacred to the region's aboriginal inhabitants. Given the long and riveting history attached to this hallowed rock, the aura of mysticality and mystery that clings to Uluru should come as no surprise. Not only does the rock's flaky surface change color throughout the day – going from a deep violet with hints of gray to a light lilac, to a fiery orange-red during sunrise, and from its usual apricot-gold to a faded orange, to a dreamy purplish-pink at dusk – Uluru, they say, is an endless source of inexplicable happenings and paranormal occurrences.
Once the sacred guardian of New Zealand’s native forests, the huia was a symbol of the land’s unique beauty and spirituality. The rare bird’s tragic extinction in the early 1900s represents a shot to the heart of Aotearoa (New Zeal...
On the 25th August 1895, Ernest Alfred Hall was born into a pioneering Australian family that lived on a 313-acre property called 'Cloverdale' near the hamlet of Beech Forest, south of the Otway Ranges, some 200 kilometres south west of Me...
A memoir of a woman's journey into remote Arnhem Land in Australia being adopted into a tribe. Her transition into a new world and a new life with the Yol?u people and her experiences with culture, kinship, language and traditional ceremonies.
Robert O'Hara Burke (1821-1861) was one of the great Victorian explorers. In 1860 he was appointed to lead the Victorian Exploring Expedition, which aimed to cross the Australian continent from south to north. The expedition left Melbourne on Monday...
Marikoriko, the first woman, and Tiki, her Creator.Hupene, the old Tohunga, squats muttering on the floor beside his carved ancestor Tiki.Tiki is a God who in the dim long ago helped to build the world, and the whose carved image is now supporting t...
The Jerilderie Letter By Ned Kelly Narrated by Denis Daly Edward "Ned" Kelly (1854 -1880) was the last and most celebrated Australian bushranger (outlaw). After being implicated in the shooting of three policemen ...
In the summer of 1839, 26-year-old Louisa Anne Meredith, in the company of her husband, Charles Meredith, sailed from England to the British colony of New South Wales, in what was then New Holland. Four years later, she published a detailed...
Although Australia was actually colonized by the forced dispossession of the indigenous Aboriginals, the Commonwealth of Australia came about by the free federation of six self-governing British colonies in 1901, which makes it one of just a handfu...
The Birdsville Track runs through three deserts, from Marree in northern South Australia, to Birdsville in outback Queensland. This legendary, dirt road has a rich folk history, intriguing culture and unique ecosystems. But it doesn't give up its se...