As the sun lowers, Earth's atmosphere scatters shorter blue light waves, allowing only red wavelengths to strike the sandstone and amplify its striking color.

The Anangu consider Uluru a deeply sacred site where ancestral creation spirits reside, making the act of walking on it highly disrespectful to their culture.

While this towering sandstone formation rises 348 meters above the desert plain, geologists estimate that at least 2.5 kilometers of its bulk extends below ground.

The unweathered sandstone at the core of the monolith is actually grey, but its high iron content literally rusts upon contact with oxygen in the desert air.