June 2014 - Derby to Bungle Bungle

After spending 18 days sunning ourselves in Broome, we moved further north to Derby which is at the western end of the legendary Gibb River Road.

Derby has wide, boab tree lined streets which were designed to accommodate the mule and camel teams of the past.  The huge tides that the Kimberly region is known for is well demonstrated at the jetty in Derby with daily high tides above 10 metres.

Low tide at Derby jetty

We couldn’t believe it when we saw the low tide mark and then went back the next day to see the high tide. 

I couldn’t even begin to estimate how many million litres of water flow underneath the jetty every time the tide goes in and out, it looks more like a river flowing after a major flood event.

High tide at Derby jetty

This is the dirtiest sea water we have seen along this coast, possibly as it continually flows over the mud flats as the tide moves in and out.  As we move further into the Kimberly region we see more and bigger Boab Trees which are a large deciduous tree occurring on sandy plains, creek beds and stony ridges throughout the Kimberley region.

The distinctive immense trunk varies from bottle-shape to unusual, even, grotesque shapes, sometimes with many stems.  During the dry season leaves fall revealing the characteristic bare-branched skeleton.  Leaf-fall enhances the boab's drought tolerance.

Boabs are extremely hardy. Examples can be seen of trees completely removed from the soil by wind, floodwater or earthworks, yet they have continued growing and taken root in the new location.  This has been exploited and large boabs have been successfully transplanted, examples of which can be found in Derby where boabs have been transplanted and growing successfully in the main street.  One Aboriginal story on the appearance of the Boab Tree says it was once beautiful and because of its beauty it became arrogant.  The gods punished the tree by inverting it, thus making its roots the branches.  To compensate the tree was made immortal. This is why a dead boab tree is rarely seen.  A more plausible explanation for it seeming to be immortal is that when the tree falls over, roots sprout from the underside and branches grow from the top of the trunk, if not, the very soft pulpy wood is quickly destroyed by animals, insects and fungus.

The Boab Prison Tree just out of Derby is hollow and large enough to allow six adults to sit comfortably inside.  The tree got its name as it was reported to have been used as a prison.  There are a number of versions to the story as to how this name came about. In the early days of Derby, the tree was used as a final stop before the police patrol brought native prisoners into town.  They were given a wash at the nearby spring and provided with clothing. They were then placed inside the tree until ready to leave OR they were chained in a ring around the tree.  The other story goes that one local resident went crazy from the extreme heat and too much alcohol, and wandered off.  After searching for two days, the police found him inside the boab tree.  On returning to the town he claimed the police had locked him up inside.  The Prison Boab Tree could be said to be the largest single trunked tree in Australia.  It has a girth of 14.7 metres and is believed to be some 1500 years old!  That means that it was a seedling in 439 AD in the time of the Roman Empire.

The longest cattle trough in the southern hemisphere, measuring some 120 metres in Iength is also at Derby.  It was designed in 1910 by then the road board clerk John Blain.  The story goes that Mr Blain had asked the pastoralists why they were not paying their rates.  They indicated that they received very little value from the Road Board and what they really needed was decent watering point for their mobs of cattle when they drove them into town for on shipping from the port.  Mr Blain designed the trough and they nearby bore was sunk.  The trough and bore were completed in 1911. The bore was drilled to a depth of 322 meters and a windmill was fitted in the 1920's. ln the old days the trough and bore had such a capacity that mobs of around 1000 head of cattle could be watered comfortably at one time.

Heading east, we crossed the Erskine Range and on to Fitzroy Crossing.  As the name suggests, this town sits on a crossing of the Fitzroy River which is one of the longest rivers in Australia and the longest river system in the Kimberly, which, together with it’s tributary the Hann, is 733 kilometres long and has a catchment area of 90,000 square kilometres.  The Fitzroy River holds one world record and that is that it’s flow to the ocean during the wet season is the highest in the world. Over 30,000 cubic metres of water per second flow into the ocean at the peak of the wet season.

Where there are rivers in this country there are gorges, and Geikie gorge is only half an hours drive from Fitzroy Crossing.

With that much water flowing through the gorge, the erosion has left some deep caves and crevices in the ancient limestone coral. The local aboriginal people together with the Department of Parks and Wildlife run a tour through the gorge in a very unusual 30 metre long aluminium boat that has a capacity to carry 180 people.

The river through the gorge is 40 metres deep in places and during the big floods the river rises by another 26 metres.  2011 was one of their biggest floods where the water level was 2 metres above the gazebo in the picnic grounds above the river.

Geikie gorge is very sacred to the local aborigines who have lived in this area for hundreds of years, so, as the man Geikie who this gorge was named after had never visited this area, the locals are working to have the gorge renamed to Darngku (Dar-noo) Gorge.

Now days the highway crosses the river over a single lane bridge built well above the high flood level, but back when the town was established, the crossing was a lot simpler with quite steep banks into and out of the river which meant that the crossing would have been closed for months at a time during the wet season.

As we traveled further north east on the Great Northern Highway, we came across a wayside stop called Ngumban Cliffs which had a great lookout across the valley that shows the true colours of the Kimberly.  Not much further along the road is an overnight free camp at Mary Pool which is on the Margret River.

This would be a great camp spot if there was more water in the river and pools, but after stopping for lunch and a photo of the local camp pig, we headed through to Halls Creek for the night.

Just another 110 kilometres further along the road is Mabel Downs Station who have set up a caravan park right at the entrance to Purnululu National Park, which is home to the Bungle Bungle.  After leaving the Bungle Bungle Caravan Park, it is 53 kilometres of gravel road into the visitor centre with 4 water crossings and another 5 or 6 dry creek crossings.

Very simple crossings but it still took 2 hours to get to the visitor centre.  From there we visited both the north and south of the range. There are some long walks which are not for everybody but the easy walks from the Piccaninny car park at the south end get you into Cathedral Gorge and around the Beehive Domes.

The orange and grey banding seen on the domes in this area is due to the differences in clay content and porosity of the sandstone layers.  The dark grey banding on the domes is from cyanobacteria (formerly known as “blue-green algae”).  The orange bands are due to the colour of oxidized iron compounds in the layers which dry out too quickly for the cyanobacteria to grow.

The walk through this area alone is well worth the trip in, and absolutely magnificent to see. We took a thermos and enjoyed a coffee under the shade sail before heading off to the northern end to have a look at Echidna Chasm and Mini Palms Gorge.

A truly unique and beautiful place.  It is impossible to capture the feel of this place in a photo, you have to be here to feel it.

June 2014 - Broome

Moving on to Broome, we camped under a big shady Mahogany tree in the Cable Beach Caravan Park.

Cable Beach in Broome is another of our iconic Australian tourist destinations, with its 22 kilometres of pristine white sand and the clear waters of the Indian Ocean.  It is said to be one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, and it takes its name from the communications cable which linked Broome with what is present day Indonesia and the rest of the world.

Broome Camel Safaris operate camel rides along the beach at sunset which is an experience to be remembered.  The camels are big gentle animals which are uniquely created with big feet that act as shock absorbers to spread the animals weight over a large area, so they are ideal for crossing sandy terrain.  You get into the gentle rock from side to side and the ride is very soft as compared to a horse (so I am told).  We rode on Aslan which was the biggest camel in the train, weighing in at 1,200 kilograms at an age of 32 years old.

With over 40,000 wild camels in a Australia it is uneconomical to breed camels for this work as they need to be at least 6 years old before they can be ridden.  Alison Bird is known as the “Camel Lady” of Broome and she started Broome Camel Safaris in 1994 with 3 camels she had mustered with cattle from the bush. Now days she can train a wild camel from the bush to a camel suitable to be ridden in about 3 months. They rescued a female camel from a defunct aboriginal centre but they didn't know she was pregnant, and soon after this beautiful baby was born.

Malcolm Douglas established a wilderness crocodile park here in Broome in 1983 as a research centre to gain a better understanding of these ancient reptiles.  The centre is open to the public so visitors can learn some of this knowledge and witness first hand how crocodiles react in the wild.  They feed their reptiles daily and we were interested to learn that crocodiles only eat about every 4 to 6 days, and as a large 40 year old crocodile only has a stomach about the size of a basket ball, they only eat 3 chickens when they feed.

We saw first hand just how agile these reptiles can be when a large male actually climbed over a 4 foot high fence into the area where the keeper was standing to feed it.  Luckily the keeper was able to make a quick exit.  All the old male crocs here have been “rescued” from their normal habitat as they have been animals that have caused problems to humans or farm animals.

They are very aggressive and territorial in the wild, so relocating them to wildlife parks such as this is necessary for their preservation.  It is a big responsibility for wildlife park operators such as this with relocated crocs as the crocs can easily live for 100 years and it is now the responsibility of the park operator to look after them for the rest of the crocs natural life.

It was good to see that this wildlife park is still operating after the death of Malcolm and the crocodiles are in good condition.  As well as the crocs, there are a lot of other animals and birds that are native to the Kimberly area on display here as well.

Broome has been regarded as the home of Australian pearling for a long time, and today it is considered to be the pearling capital of the world. The South Sea Pearls from this region attract top prices around the world as they are the largest and most lustrous gems from the ocean.  As we have looked at pearl jewellery many times and battled to tell the difference between the cheap ones from the market and the more expensive ones from the jeweler, we took a tour of the Willie Creek Pearl Farm to learn more about these lovely little gems.

Broome’s South Sea pearls are produced by planting a seed into either a silver or gold lipped oyster called Pinctada maxima.  As the name suggests this is the largest pearl producing oyster in the world, which can grow up to 30 cm in diameter and can weigh up to 5 kilograms.  An oyster this size would be 25 to 35 years old so there are not a lot this size found any more.  Once an oyster has been “seeded” by a highly trained pearl technician, it takes about 2 years for the pearl to grow to about 8 mm in diameter, which if it has good colour, shape and luster would be worth about $400 before setting.  After the first 2 years, the pearl is removed and a larger “seed” is planted so the oyster produces a bigger pearl over the next 2 years.  This process continues 3 times and eventually the oyster produces a pearl about 12 to 18 mm in diameter which is worth about $2,500.  They took us out on their boat and showed us oysters hanging from a long line where they sway on each tide, about 2 metres under water for 2 years while their pearl is slowly growing inside.  The oysters thrive in the nutrient rich waters around Broome, filtering over 80 litres of water per hour for microscopic phytoplankton.

During this 2 years, the oysters are removed from the water every 2 weeks to have their shells cleaned of marine fouling organisms to keep the oyster healthy while doing it’s duty. After 8 years of faithful duty to the pearl farmer, the poor old oyster ends up as meat and the shell becomes items made of mother of pearl.  Buttons, jewellery, furniture inlay, cosmetics and even iridescent paint for cars are made from the highly prized oyster shell.  Of course the sales pitch came next when they took us through their show room to see the final product.  Very nice, but we weren't tempted.  When pearling first started in Broome, it wasn't the pearl they were primarily after but the mother of pearl shell.  This shell was highly sought after for use in making buttons and other things like furniture inlay. The first pearlers to come to Broome used local aborigines to dive for the oysters, and later on many people from the Asian countries came to Broome with their own divers and equipment.

Heavy diving suits made of canvas and fitted with brass diving helmets were used.  Unfortunately a lot of divers suffered the bends from being down too deep for too long and then coming up too quickly. Between the years 1910 and 1914, 92 divers died from the bends, but the arrival of decompression chambers allowed divers who suffered the bends to be put into the chamber and the appropriate pressure applied which achieved spectacular results.

In 1915, after the chambers were introduced, only one diver died from the bends. The museum has a lot of old pearling memorabilia on display as well as some very interesting dinosaur footprints which are recoginised as the most significant in the world.

These tracks stretch for about 80 kilometres along the Broome sandstone coast.  These tracks were said to be laid down some 120 million years ago with more than 20 different species being identified. This one on show in the museum is from a small carnivorous Theropod.  The stone was cut from the rock at Crab Creek and sold on the black market.  The culprit was caught and the footprint was donated to the museum.

They say that if you can’t catch a fish in Broome, you should give up fishing.  It’s usually me who goes fishing and everyone else catches fish and I go home with nothing, well guess what, this is Broome and my luck has changed.  First try was from the beach at “The Entrance” and within an hour I had 2 nice Long Tom, the biggest one measured 680 mm. Now I had never seen these before so we gave them a go on the BBQ and they were very tasty.  Next day I went back to the same place just before low tide, and again straight after the tide change, I hooked a lovely silver trevally. My third outing brought me back to reality, I not only came home without any fish, but lost 4 hooks and sinkers on snags into the bargain.  Not to be too down hearted we headed down to the jetty the next day to give our luck a try on the rising tide. We were only there 5 minutes when Judy hooked something big, but unfortunately it took off around one of the barnacle encrusted pylons and snapped a 40 pound line like it was cotton.

Half an hour later my line went bang and I had a fight on my hands, it took off under the jetty and around the same pylon, but by giving it a bit of slack I was able to get it free and up onto the jetty.  A Giant  , commonly known as a GT around here and now I know why, it really took off quickly.  This one measured 565 mm.  A couple of fillets off this one made a beautiful meal of fresh fish.  Now I have said this before in this blog but I am going to say it again, there are some things that you see that will stay in your mind forever, and the Horizontal Falls up at Cape Leveque is another one of those things.

We took a 14 seat turbo prop jet sea plane flight with Horizontal Falls Seaplane Adventures at 6.00 am from the Broome airport, and an hour later found ourselves landing on the calm waters of Talbot Bay, just 500 metres away from the gap in the surrounding cliffs that makes the Horizontal Falls.  This company has various large pontoons and 4 or 5 large house boats moored in Talbot Bay to accommodate day guests like us as well as overnight guests who want the experience of a night in one of Australia’s most peaceful areas.  Coffee and biscuits were served on our arrival and then a change into our swimming gear for a quick dip with the sharks. This was 7:30 am but the water was beautiful and warm.

They have a large cage built into one of the pontoons and after the crew throwing a few bits of chicken into the water, sharks appeared from nowhere. This also attracted schools of other fish of all different sizes. Breakfast of bacon and egg roll washed down with more coffee followed, and then we were kitted up with life jackets for our next part of the adventure.

We boarded their 900 horse power jet stream boat and cruised through the untouched surrounding bays and creeks. One bay is named Cyclone Bay as it is so well protected by the high cliffs, the pearling luggers used to shelter from cyclones in this bay.  Now days they moor their platforms and houseboats in there during the wet season and come back every March to find them all still floating and in one piece.

The sediment layers in the cliff walls are very different in here in the way that they were formed when the pressure pushed them up from the seas many years ago. This area of Australia has some of the biggest tides in the world, and as a result of this Talbot bay has the only two water falls in the world that run horizontally. These two waterfalls provide a perfect demonstration of the awesome power of the Kimberley’s huge ten metre tides. We arrived at the first water fall in the middle of a rising tide and the water was fair whooping through.

The opening in the sheer cliff face is 20 metres wide for the water to get through into the next bay. The distance through the cliffs is about 50 metres and the difference in height of the water from one side to the other was about 1 metre. The skipper lined up the gap and kicked the 900 horsepower into gear and through the white water we went and down to the lower level of the next bay.  WOW!!.  We turned around to look at where we just came from, talk about shooting the rapids.  So that was easy says the skipper, now all we have to do is get back up the falls to where we just came from.  Now I thought we used lots of power to get through the rapids going down, but we must have only been at about quarter throttle, as the roar she let out going back up was just sheer power.  By this time all on board had white knuckles hanging on, so just to prove that he could handle the boat, he put it into a full power u turn and straight back down the falls again.  So that was the easy bit he said, now for a look at the narrow gap between the second and third bays.

This gap is only 10 metres wide and didn't appear as long as the first, but the same amount of water was trying to channel it’s way through, so the difference in the water levels was over 2 metres. I was pretty happy when he said that it was far too dangerous to go through, but not only that, the 900 horse power would not be anywhere near enough to get us back out.  He very skilfully let the boat back down to the top of the falls so we could all get a photo, and it took almost half throttle on the engines just to keep us sitting at the top of the falls without the current washing us further down.  A very quick trip back across the second bay and up the first falls saw us sitting back on the pontoon just as our seaplane was landing ready to take us back to Broome.

The trip back took us back across Talbot Bay to get an aerial view of the falls and then a low level flight across the Buccaneer Archipelago to see the hundreds of islands dotted throughout, then onto Cape Leveque, Lombadina, Beagle Bay, Willie Creek Pearl Farm and across Cable Beach before landing back in Broome.     Along with the extremely high tides comes the extremely low tides which causes another unique phenomenon.

Staircase to the Moon occurs when the full moon rises over the exposed mudflats of Roebuck Bay at extremely low tide, which creates the optical illusion of a staircase reaching up to the moon.  The tourist brochure advertises the time that the moon will come up and literally hundreds of people line the beach to see it happen.  Sure enough, just about to the second the full moon started to rise and the reflection across the water and mudflats gave that appearance.  The locals really embrace this occurrence and there is a beachfront market to mark the occasion with a real carnival atmosphere.  Funny what the full moon does to some people.
We were very lucky to have great neighbours camped beside us in Broome.  Robert and Kay are regulars in Broome having spent the last 7 out of 9 winters there, they were able to give us a lot on good inside information on where to visit while we were there, as well as places to stay as we travel around the Kimberly.  Robert and I spent a lot of great hours fishing, without a lot of success, but as we both say, we had a lot of fun trying.

Robert and Kay took us to one of their favourite fishing spots at Coconut Well, 20 odd kilometres north of Broome.  What a fantastic spot, beautiful white sand and well away from the hum drum of Broom, what a fantastic morning.
With the tourist season now coming into full swing, our site was pre booked for other campers, so after 18 nights in Broome we headed further north to Derby and let our adventure into the Kimberly continue.