Kimberley 3 ~ 30th June to 17th July

We are currently at Barn Hill on the west coast where the Indian Ocean is our swimming hole and a working cattle station is our caravan park. Before we arrived here we spent a wonderful 9 days in Derby with a 2 day excursion to Windjana Gorge followed by a week in Broome.

Derby

Our first few days in Derby were rest days after which we explored the town, indulged our penchant for bird watching at the waste-water wetlands and discovered the phenomenon of the massive tides of Derby and King Sound, attended several events of the Boab Festival and watched people tossing their pots over the Derby pier in the hope of catching a sizeable Mud Crab. Several times at the pier I saw a beautiful Brahminy Kite.

One of my highlights in Derby was a concert “Telling Stories Through Music” featuring the Aboriginal opera singer Deborah Cheetham and artists from the West Australian Opera. Deborah gained fame by singing at the opening of the Sydney 2000 Olympics. She has written an opera about the birth of the civil rights movement for Indigenous Australians in 1939 which will be debuted in Melbourne in October 2010.

During our stay in Derby we went to the Mowanjum aboriginal community for a corroboree they stage each year for visitors. This community is made up of 3 separate language groups from the area who share the spirituality of the Wandjina. They have a website which can help understand a great deal about their art, history, culture, spirituality and organisation.

http://www.mowanjumarts.com/aboutus.html

We were treated to a variety of corroborees telling stories about their spirituality. There was also a guest performance by a Torres Strait Islander group which has settled in Derby. I felt really honoured to be there. For the final corroboree dance everyone in the audience was invited to join in and so a large circle of black and white people danced and were joined together in happiness and joyous celebration. They have an arts centre at their community which was opened tonight and houses some amazing art work for sale. I bought a book on Mowanjum spirituality and have been struck by some similarities with Christianity. The Mowanjum people have a living and developing spirituality and a life which embraces much of modern technology. They provide a wonderful place for their children to grow and develop. The children were involved in the corroborees and were as excited as any children would be who are getting dressed up and about to give a concert.

Windjana Gorge

For our visit to Windjana Gorge we packed the caravan tightly and headed off along the notorious Gibb River Road. It was mostly bitumen along the stretch we covered.

After we turned off the GRR the corrugations began and it took us over an hour to do the next 22kms. We were concerned for the caravan but continued anyway looking for the best bits of road and driving slowly to avoid the damage of corrugations.

We set ourselves up in the fantastic camping ground of Windjana Gorge NP, fixed the loose parts of the caravan, cleaned out the red dust and had lunch.

I found a Great Bowerbird and his bower in the middle of the camping ground. It was so neat and clean.

I went for a walk later and made my way into the gorge. What a magic place! I persuaded David to come with me later as the day cooled into evening. We took some photos of the sunset changing the colour of the Napier Range. It turns a beautiful red/brown, rather like Uluru and other ranges we have seen. The colours are vivid at sunset and sunrise, very special times of the day.

On day two I set off early in the morning with the binoculars and the camera and went into the gorge again. The sun was making the place beautiful again. It was cool in the shade and as I arrived at Bandigan rock the sun covered much of the sand and warmed the whole place up.

Later after breakfast we both set out to walk the length of the Gorge walk a distance of 7km return. It was a 5 hour walk for us as we stopped often to look at birds, take photos and marvel at the beauty of the place. We clambered over rocks, trudged through deep sand and scratched our way through prickle bushes. The Lennard River runs through the gorge but there isn’t a real flow of water during the wet season, just some large residual pools joined by a slight flow.

The freshwater crocodiles take advantage of this beautiful place. They sun themselves and swim in the river. They have the north and western part of the gorge to themselves as humans aren’t allowed on that side of the river. It is really a good place to be able to watch the crocodiles in their natural habitat. They are not dangerous unless you interfere with them.

After lunch, when I had recovered from our gorge walk, I took off on the Savannah walk which is a short walk through the savannah grasslands and along the south eastern wall of the ranges. The interpretative signs tell about some of the plants and animals which live around here. I was looking for the Lillimilura Homestead track so that I could visit the ruins of the old police outpost from the 19^th century. I walked around all the campgrounds to no avail until I realised that the walk has been closed for some reason. The walk was not in vain though, as just on sunset, yes beautiful again, I saw something moving in the grass at the side of the campground road. There were 6 or so quail feeding and I was able to get a reasonable look at them but I am still not sure what sort they were.

It is truly a lovely place to be.

Broome

We set off very early in the morning to see if we could find a spot to stay in a caravan park in the fabled Broome, the focus of many people’s holidays. We arrived at 8:40am and booked into the Roebuck Bay Caravan Park, finding a place for our new friends here as well. So much for all the stories about not being able to get a place to stay in Broome in July!

On the first night we took our chairs out to the grass along the front of the caravan park which overlooks Roebuck Bay to view the phenomenon known as “Stairway to the moon”. As the full moon rises it reflects on the exposed tidal mud flats at low tide and creates an impression of a stairway to the moon.

For our stay in Broome we wanted to see and do lots of the things which make it a famous place, to find out why it is that some people come here year after year and spend 3 to 6 months.

We have found:

• Markets – multi-cultural and exciting

• The famous Cable Beach – 22km of beautiful, clear sandy beach which only sometimes is closed due to crocodiles and where thousands of people come to the beach to view the sunset every day. People take camel rides along the beach at sunset and have photos taken with the magic colours of the sunset sky in the background.

• An historical exhibition of the Sisters of St John of God beautifully presented and detailing their work here since the early 20^th century.
• A strong pearling history and lots of pearls to buy – from $20 to over $20,000.
• The working Willie Creek pearl farm.
• The Broome Bird Observatory which we visited at the wrong time of the year to see the thousands of migratory birds which use the rich mudflats to fatten up for the long flight to a variety of destinations north of Australia, some as far away as 10,000kms.
• China Town, the main shopping centre of Broome.
• The deep water port from where live cattle is exported.

• And the Lighthouse where the ospreys have taken over one platform of the tank-like structure for their nest and where some young over-testosteroned young men found rocks from which they jumped into the swirling and dangerous surf.

Some people come to Broome every year just to enjoy the warm winter here.

Barn Hill

From Broome we have decided (although all decisions are subject to change without notice!) to follow the Warlu Way to Coral Bay.

http://www.warluway.com.au/

Our first stop is a relaxing beach holiday here at Barn Hill. This farm-stay spot, on a working cattle station, is more than a caravan park. It has its own little recreation area where you can sit with friends or enjoy a little “something” from their very homely shop. Often they have something “on” for tea. Tonight it was a sausage sizzle, Sunday it will be a roast dinner and on Wednesdays they light the BBQ for people to bring their own meat and cook and spend time together. Today they also had a bowls tournament (bare feet essential) on their very own bowling green. This lasted all afternoon and judging by the standard of competition there are many bowlers on holiday.

I expect to spend much time on the beach here before we leave on the 24^th July.

Blessings to you all and we will meet again somewhere along the Warlu Way.