Wallace Rockhole
Words, voices and images: Connecting to cultures around the world
"This journey is always an extraordinary one. The shades and colours of the ancient rock forms that make the West MacDonnell Ranges' landscapes, some of the most compelling on Earth, tell us of long histories, here is the earth laid bare in all its ancientness".
The flight from Darwin is descending, we bank and fly low over the MacDonnell Ranges. Alice Springs Airport is just ahead. Bags unloaded we jump into the car and head mostly west to Wallace Rockhole.
The extraordinary journey is more so in the late afternoon light. The vastness of the landscape and the curvature of the earth and sky are there before us. It is almost as if we were driving inside a giant bubble defined by our planet’s biosphere, its atmosphere so perfectly described by the perspective of distant clouds in the reddening light blue sky as they touch the Earth at distant edge. This is an extraordinary feeling and unlike anything else, as perceptions of time and space somehow alter here, there is a sense of being a living part of our living planet, all within a vast universe, everything connected, as we become one with the Earth.
This is Western Arrernte (Aranda) country. Here in Central Australia Arrernte lands are significantly large and cover substantially more than 100,000 square kilometers, so Arnhem Land scale, but desert country, not wetland.
We love our trips to Wallace Rockhole (Urana in the local language), the long discussions with friends under a starlit sky that on a clear night, which is most nights, is always there to dazzle us in our minuteness amidst the vast scale of desert country and night sky.
The satellites pass silently above reflecting their pinpoints of sunlight into the darkness below. Then there is a shower of stardust as more meteorites collide with the Earth’s atmosphere. The talk is of spectacular nights past, not from single shootings stars but by thousands.
Closer and softer, the white forms of owls fly silently overhead.
The Wallace Rockhole community has grown steadily over the last 45 years or so. The houses and wonderful community school sit below a ridge line of the ancient ranges that surround us. Recently we have made journeys to the top of these ridges with Aboriginal friends.
Wallace Rockhole was founded in 1973 as an outstation to the larger and nearby community of Hermannsburg (Ntaria) (founded as a Lutheran Mission in 1877). Wallace Rockhole is now one of three main regional communities in this part of Arrernte country, the third community is called Areyonga (there are also outstations).
During our stay in Wallace Rockhole we walk in country with friends, visit small gorges and the rock hole, still with its supply of water at summer end. We explore the rock art and ancient symbols, signposts with their meanings on the rock surface of the tracks as they wind through these sheltered gorges. We sit in a dry riverbed at night with Bobby and friends around a campfire and listen to the stories of this place.
We make a lot of trips back to Alice Springs as there is a lot to do here, we never tire of the drive which will always remain in memory.
The extraordinary journey is more so in the late afternoon light. The vastness of the landscape and the curvature of the earth and sky are there before us. It is almost as if we were driving inside a giant bubble defined by our planet’s biosphere, its atmosphere so perfectly described by the perspective of distant clouds in the reddening light blue sky as they touch the Earth at distant edge. This is an extraordinary feeling and unlike anything else, as perceptions of time and space somehow alter here, there is a sense of being a living part of our living planet, all within a vast universe, everything connected, as we become one with the Earth.
This is Western Arrernte (Aranda) country. Here in Central Australia Arrernte lands are significantly large and cover substantially more than 100,000 square kilometers, so Arnhem Land scale, but desert country, not wetland.
We love our trips to Wallace Rockhole (Urana in the local language), the long discussions with friends under a starlit sky that on a clear night, which is most nights, is always there to dazzle us in our minuteness amidst the vast scale of desert country and night sky.
The satellites pass silently above reflecting their pinpoints of sunlight into the darkness below. Then there is a shower of stardust as more meteorites collide with the Earth’s atmosphere. The talk is of spectacular nights past, not from single shootings stars but by thousands.
Closer and softer, the white forms of owls fly silently overhead.
The Wallace Rockhole community has grown steadily over the last 45 years or so. The houses and wonderful community school sit below a ridge line of the ancient ranges that surround us. Recently we have made journeys to the top of these ridges with Aboriginal friends.
Wallace Rockhole was founded in 1973 as an outstation to the larger and nearby community of Hermannsburg (Ntaria) (founded as a Lutheran Mission in 1877). Wallace Rockhole is now one of three main regional communities in this part of Arrernte country, the third community is called Areyonga (there are also outstations).
During our stay in Wallace Rockhole we walk in country with friends, visit small gorges and the rock hole, still with its supply of water at summer end. We explore the rock art and ancient symbols, signposts with their meanings on the rock surface of the tracks as they wind through these sheltered gorges. We sit in a dry riverbed at night with Bobby and friends around a campfire and listen to the stories of this place.
We make a lot of trips back to Alice Springs as there is a lot to do here, we never tire of the drive which will always remain in memory.
No items found.
Related Stories
Twisted histories
In this film the founder of the Wallace Rockhole Community and Ilpurla Outstation in Central Australia, talks about what happened to the old people of the Finke River country.
Read the full story
Hermannsburg
Not that far from Wallace Rockhole in Tjoritja (the West MacDonnell Ranges country) is the community of Hermannsburg (the sacred site of Ntaria). The township is 130km to the west of Alice Springs.
Read the full story
Namatjira’s front door
To the south west of Alice Springs we stand in a place where a remarkable individual lived and worked. And we enter through Albert Namatjira’s front door. We have not been to this place before.
Read the full story