Sat 31 Aug 2013 – Rusty Cafe and Lazing around Wyndham

We had a nice lazy day today and stayed in Wyndham partly because they show a movie on Saturday night at the outdoor picture theatre and also because there are markets on Sun mornings.

After a slow start, we returned to the Rusty Shed cafe so Rodger could sample their sausage rolls. He says they are easily the best in Australia, so far, and so are their mango smoothies. Our friend Ben, from the camping ground, was working here today – that’s him in the kitchen preparing food.

Now replete, we went down to the new wharf for Rodger to try his luck for a Barramundi. Still no luck, though something came and took his lure.

When he admitted defeat for today, we drove around town, trying to find out what movie was on tonight, where the churches are and what time the services are tomorrow. On the way, we came across some amazingly lifelike bronze statues of an Aboriginal family with Dreamtime animals.

We finally found out that there wouldn't be a movie tonight as they showed a kid's one last night!

At our camping ground is the biggest Boab "in captivity", we went to see if it was as big as the one at Big Horse Creek and we decided it's even bigger.

In spite of having such a lazy day, I was really sleepy after dinner and fell asleep reading before it was even 8.00pm.

Fri 30 Aug 2013 – Exploring Wyndham

It was so nice to sleep in this morning and not have to rush when we got up. We had a leisurely breakfast and used the washing machine for our sheets, towels and dusty, sweaty walking clothes. We set off to look at the Old Town down near the Port. Rodger was very impressed with a new wharf they've built, especially for recreational fishing.

Most of the buildings are derelict but one old shed has been turned into really nice cafe. Rodger had a mango smoothie and, because I couldn't have the milk, I had a small cube of frozen mango and a canned drink. This was a big treat, as we haven' t even seen a cafe since we left Bondi.

We did the tourist thing and visited the big crocodile - my grandchildren would love this one!

and then went backs the lookout to see the rivers at high tide. It was good to see it in daylight and be able to pick out each river. Most of the land around Wyndham is vast tidal flats, edged with mangroves, like long tentacles, reaching deep into the flats.

We had a good view of the docks and all the road trains delivering loads of iron ore and nickel. This is loaded onto barges by conveyors and then transferred to large cargo ships that cannot come into dock because there's so much silt near the banks. They also still ship some live cattle from here.

From the lookout you could also see the new part of Wyndham spreading out below

Looks like they are building some modern housing commission houses too - looks great!

 When we arrived back, with a big load of shopping, we made the unpleasant discovery that, because it had been open all night, our fridge was too iced up to close the door. At least it was a good place to defrost it, as we could put all the food in the camp kitchen until it was done.

It was lovely to be able to talk to all our friends at FNG on Skype this evening. Again we had dinner with Laura & Ben and Steve.

Thurs 29 Aug 2013 – The Bungles - Singing in “The Cathedral”

Woke really early again at 5.30am, had breakfast, packed up, then drove for an hour to the southern part of the Bungle Bungles Park ready to start walking at 8am. The first walk took us past the beautiful domes which are the quintessential of the Bungle Bungles. So many amazing formation, including elephant rock and the domes themselves just go on and on.

We also did a walk called "The Cathedral" because it leads to a huge, cavern, hollowed out by a huge waterfall that runs in the Wet. There's still a pool at the bottom, but green & stagnant. Rodger & I sang a song, to test the acoustics.

Soon some other people arrived having walked up the valley and said the singing was beautiful.  They asked could we do it again so they could record it – our song was from Solidarity’s repertoire “Mantaku” – an Aboriginal Song that seemed fitting for this place. One lady said it had made the walk a really special experience for her. We felt so honoured that we'd been able to give her a gift for her memories.

Our last walk was along Piccaninny Creek to the lookout. It was good but "The Cathedral" was definitely the highlight for us. It was now 11.30 am and the heat was radiating off the rocks, so we drank lots of water on the way back to the car.

When we finished walking, it was time for us to get on the road for the long drive out. We decided not to go back to Kununurra for supplies, but to go North to Wyndham, where 5 rivers meet. The 5hr drive was hard going as we were physically tired and very hot (38.5 C) however, we made it safely to Wyndham in time watch the sun set over the place where the rivers meet.

We then went to the camping ground which has a great camp kitchen and, more importantly, a pool! It was so good to have a dip and then a real shower!

We made some new friends, Laura & Ben, French backpackers, who are working in the supermarket here.

When we were getting ready for bed, a large animal suddenly loomed out of the dark and came right up to us. With one accord, we leapt into the van and slammed the door. We were pretty embarrassed in the morning, when we looked out and saw it was just a wild donkey roaming about!

Wed 28th Aug – Bungles – Echidna Gorge & Bath time!

It was pretty cold in the early hours of the morning as we're near the desert again - I think we'll be digging out the duvet again for tonight! Anyway, it helped us to get up early so we could go walking before it got too hot. We were very pleased with ourselves when we left the camping ground at 7.15am!

Our first walk was to & through Echidna Chasm. It was very narrow and shady and eventually opened out into a cave like area. It had a good echo so Rodger and I tried it out with a couple of songs. (nobody else was about so early).

Most of the rock is conglomerate, made up of many tiny round pebbles all squashed together.

By 9.00am we were on our way to the beginning of our next walk. This was very different and took us right into a valley or pound surrounded by rock formations that were all folded and baggy like elephants. It had lots of palms and eucalypts inside and was a beautiful spot- again we had it to ourselves.

We learnt, from the information boards, that Purnalulu is just a young upstart (360 million) and that the Osmand Ranges nearby are 1.6 billion years old.

By now it was 11.00am and getting hot, so we headed back to the camping ground, but on the way we followed a bush tucker trail and learnt about the local food plants like the black speargrass that has a sweet watery juice (which we tried) and the candelabra wattle used for making spears.

We were tired and hot when we got back and enjoyed the luxury of a glass of cold water with ice blocks from our fridge. As there were no showers or swimming holes to cool down in and nobody was in the camping ground, we stripped off and had fun getting clean and cool by throwing a bucket of water over each other - it felt so good!

We had a lazy afternoon, sitting in the shade and playing harp & guitar until it was time to go to the sunset spot again.  Lovely flowers around us like this one - for you Mum!