Kununurra to Derby

Day 132

Beard update week 6. The beard continues to grow but is becoming more hassle than it is worth.

Head out to Mirim National park, just outside Kununurra. A tiny little park but with (apparently) similar rock formations to the Bungle Bungles.  On our way we stop in town at the tourist information to get a pass for the Western Australian National Parks. The pass is $40 for a month or $80 for a year (go figure) or you can pay for each park individually ($10 a go!).

We arrive at the information but as we approach the door the whole place looks shut. Sure enough there is no tourist information Saturday or Sunday (After all there won’t be any tourists about on the weekend)!!

Continue on to the park hoping that we may be able to get our passes there but it’s just pay and display ticket machine for the day passes. Luckily the machine is broken and so we can enter for free today.

It’s hot when we park up and we are just contemplating which of the walks to do when a woman approaches us and asks if she can join us on the walk to the lookout as she doesn’t want to do it alone. Of course we oblige and the three of us head off up into the hills.

The lookout is not far and is pretty hard going in the heat but we are rewarded with some nice views back into town and of the range. The landscape is reminiscent of the formations above Kings Canyon and again looks like a film set (a cross between Star wars and Crocodile Dundee).

We give the woman (we never got her name) a lift back into town and when we return to the campsite I think it is high time I got the hammock out and spent some quality time in it.

Just after sunset and we hear the tell-tale splashes in the water that let us know the crocs are out and about again. We go to the water torches in hand and our mate is waiting just in the water near Polly again.

Once again doors are locked and prayers are said before bed.

Day 133

Good morning

Pack up in the morning ready for our onward journey and  once again head into town to the tourist office to get our National parks pass. It’s definitely open today and we can tell that by the line-up of people already waiting there. We wait in line and when we get to the counter…

They have sold out of passes!!

So drive back across town to the National Parks office where we finally get our pass and head off.

Our plan is to head for a campsite just within the Bungle Bungles (As far as we can get in a 2WD). But the woman tells us that there are bushfires and the access road to the park is closed!

Stop for fuel just outside the park and sure enough there are signs up saying that people have been evacuated form the park this morning and the road is closed (funnily enough the actual park is open but you can only get there in a plane!).

Rethinking we head on to Halls Creek (or as we heard someone say ‘Hells Crack’) a further 150KM’s and check in to the campsite before popping to the shop to get some liquid refreshment.

We have been experiencing alcohol restrictions (in one form or another) since Cape tribulation but here they have taken it to the next level. All you can buy in the shop is light beer. No wine and definitely no spirits, ever!

Deciding against light beer our only other option is to go the one resort hotel in town and pay an arm and a leg for a schooner, which we do (begrudgingly).

Day 134

Up and on to Fitzroy crossing today, a 300KM drive west.  An uneventful few hours later we arrive and as we are checking in to our campsite enquire about alcohol in Fitzroy crossing.

We are told that this is a dry community and no (take away) alcohol is available in town at all! Again we are more than welcome to go into the resort bar and pay a small fortune for a beer but we decide to give it a miss today.

Set up and I decide to pop out on the bike down to the old Fitzroy river crossing to check out a fishing spot (Carmen gives it a miss and reads her book at the van). Hot again and although it’s not too far the road is unsealed and pretty corrugated so it’s a hard ride. Looks good when I get there though with some submerged snags (A Barramundi’s favourite hang-out) and the crossing itself looks promising too.

Head back to report my findings and after a cooling swim in the pool set up the rod and head back down the track to the river for dusk (Carmen doesn’t like the sound of the unsealed road and stays at the van).

Set up excited at my prospects but an hour or so later (and not even one bite) I pack up and slightly dejected head back (I ended up cycling about 15KM’s on that rough unsealed road and Carmen has nearly finished her book!).

Day 135

A short drive this morning, just 20Km away is Geckie gorge (not another gorge). This one formed from a fossilised coral reef that has been worn away by the wet season for a few millennia.

We have packed up and set off early but it still manages to feel far too hot when we set off and the going isn’t easy either, soft sand most of the 2.2KM walk through the gorge means that by the time we get to the other end we are both sweating buckets and knackered.

The rocky sides to the gorge are pretty and you can see the fossilised coral reef clearly as well as the high water mark which is way above your head (Glad were not here in the wet then).

Back to the van and we are both hot and tired so a rest in the shade (and some elevensies) before heading onwards 260KM to Derby.

Arrive and check into an ‘adults only’ (seriously) campsite. I immediately had visions of a playboy mansion type of affair and was only too happy when Carmen agreed to go there. Our (my) dreams were soon brought back into line when we pulled into what is basically a large gravel car park with power and water.

We had heard that alcohol was freely allowed in Derby and felt a little like naughty schoolkids as we went into the Woolworths liquor shop. We soon found out that Derby has its own set of rules which, to be honest beggar belief.

Alcohol is for sale in liquor shops which open at midday, between the hours of midday and 1pm you can only buy mid strength beer and no wine or spirits. After 1pm (just an hour later) you can buy what you like and however much you like! This was illustrated as we walked in to the bottle shop (at about 1.30pm) and a guy and his mate were buying over a thousand dollars worth of booze for a party.

Back at the campsite there are only a few of us tonight, a couple who are leaving tomorrow and a long termer who works up at the local prison. We are parked right next to the BBQ area and the owners come out to have dinner with the other couple and the bloke and so before long we are over there cooking our tea and chatting away.

We also have the privilege of seeing a Family of owls in that live in the tree opposite Polly out and about with a young one that can’t fly yet and stays in the nest. All very nice and a further treat the man (who is leaving) has made a trifle for desert and we end up getting a bowl.

Good trifle it was too (He was an Englishman).

Day 136

Up early (still getting used to the time change) and off on the tourist trail around Derby.

First stop the Prison Boab tree, a stopping place for prisoners (mostly aboriginals) on the way to the Derby prison. Not a particularly nice historical place but the tree is good and estimated at over a thousand years old.  Boabs are a protected species in Derby and the roads had to be built around them (there are a few quirks in town) so there are a lot about and a lot of very old ones which is great, they are trees with personalities and we both have really taken to them in the past couple of weeks.

Right next to the tree is Myall bore, to be honest it’s is one of the least interesting things I hope we see. A concrete water trough that was used for feeding cattle (yawn) and was the largest of it’s kind in the world at the time (more yawning).

On to the dinner tree which used to be a drovers campspot just outside town and the site of another big Boab, This one is also good as its right on the edge of… well nothing really, just flat as far as the eye can see.

Next stop is the Jetty and a chance to check out some fishing spots for later on. Looks OK but a long way to haul up a fish if you catch one.

Finally a stop at the old town Gaol. Again not a happy site and the end of the journey for the people that would have stopped at the prison tree. Conditions weren’t good and the crimes were petty by todays standards and makes it all the more harsh to see the conditions the people (mainly aboriginals) were kept in. This is also the area the famous (to some) Jundumarra lived and it was around here he organised a rebellion against the whites (I believe they are making a film about him).

Tour concluded it was back to the campsite to prepare the fishing gear and head back to the wharf for sunset. Rods and reels ready we were both confident and were already planning our first couple of fish dinners.

After a couple of hours (and a great sunset) we had nothing to show for it but returned back to the campsite happy and settled in for another night with the Owls.