Boggy Hole is a pleasant camping spot with no facilities. There are some shady campsites and swimming and canoeing may be enjoyed. On the east bank of the river is the ruin of the old police station. From this point, an old seismic track takes you due east 62 km to the Stuart Highway. The trek is scenic but very slow and will take you up to 6 hours. You cross over the Drive south from Boggy Hole 68 km to the Ernest Giles Highway, in and out of the Finke River past Cocky's Camp, Running Waters Yard and the turn off to Illamurta Spring. At the highway, turn left to the Stuart Highway or the other way to Kings Canyon.

Picture: Kings Canyon (Courtesy Random House)

Grazing depleted bush food resources. During severe droughts in the 1930s and 1950s, Aboriginal people were drawn into missions, cattle stations and government settlements by the prospect of a reliable food supply and by curiosity.

Despite attempts to settle and to school Aboriginal people in the ways of the outside world, Anangu, the original owners of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, continued their traditional ways.

They travelled traditional lands visiting kin, returning to bush foods, arranging and attending ceremonies and teaching young people the skills and beliefs that had always been essential to their survival. Anangu maintained their ties with traditional lands.

Geologically, Uluru and Kata Tjuta are the relics of an immense bed of sedimentary rock now almost entirely covered by debris from erosion and by wind-blown sand. The 36 individual domes of Kata Tjuta once may have been a single dome many times the size of Uluru. The features of the inselbergs and the surrounding plain are the product of millions of years of weathering and erosion.

Aboriginal people know that Uluru and Kata Tjuta were created and shaped into their unique forms during the Tjukurpa or creation period. Individual features represent the visual imprints and physical proof of the activities of ancestral beings of the Tjukurpa.

To have survived in a land that others call harsh, Aboriginal people needed to know their land well. Today, they are passing on their knowledge and their skill in 'reading' the land so that others might understand and appreciate it as they do.

So far 150 different kinds of birds, 22 mammals, many reptiles and frogs, and nearly 400 plant species have been recorded in the Park area. Visitors are likely to see only a few of these. However, those who take time to walk the tracks will be rewarded by seeing fascinating dryland plants and animals which cope with this environment.

In 1987 the Park was inscribed to the United Nations World Heritage List. It is also one of twelve Australian Biosphere Reserves.

Picture: (Courtesy DFAT)