Bent Spoon Nomination for Climbing Ban

ULURU KATA-TJUTA NATIONAL PARK BOARD AND PARKS AUSTRALIA are up for a Bent Spoon award from Australian Skeptics for the ban on Climbing Ayers Rock.

The nomination reads....

Uluru (Ayers Rock) was probably first climbed by the first humans to arrive in central Australia about 30,000 years ago. This first group of humans left their mark on Uluru and Kata Tjuta (the Olgas) in the form of petroglyphs that remain a mystery to both the current custodians and anthropologists. Based on the inclusion of the dingo in their creation myths the current custodians the Anangu people arrived at the Rock only about 4000 years ago. They also climbed it as demonstrated by their myth of the Hare Wallaby Men who dragged the “Ndaltawalta Pole” (a large flake of arkose on the northwest corner of the Rock) across the summit leaving the deep grooves that we now know are due to differential erosion. In the 1970s the traditional owners had no problem with tourists climbing the rock. Paddy Uluru who was recognised as the Principal Owner of the Rock is reported to have stated that the physical act of climbing was of no cultural significance. In an interview with the ABC in 1975 his brother Toby Naninga stated that aside from the men’s initiation cave and the “Ndaltawalta Pole” tourists could go anywhere else. In a move to support the handover in 1983 the Central Land Council and the Pitjantjatjara Council indicated for tourists that access to Uluru after the handover would be “business as usual”. The looming ban on climbing Uluru simply does not make any sense and will end a cultural tradition that likely stretches back 30,000 years. It’s sad that myth and superstition are being used to prevent people from enjoying the natural world.

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Right to Climb

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