Day 1 drove round to get our bearings, s very unusual town, in fact I still haven't found a consolidated shopping area. Woolworths & a fuel station & Mitre 10 as you enter, still on the main highway & 1&1/2 k along the road there is an IGA a Butcher, a Coffee shop, a Home Hardware, Pharmacy & I think a gift shop. This latter group are very near our Park! Then it's straight on to the port. There is a school, police station & sports field. The 1&1/2k strip is duel highway with Boab trees along it, magnificent.
It is predominantly an Aboriginal town and has some sad history of the whit mans treatment of these people.
Day 2 We were on the road at 8am heading out the Gibb River Road, we expected it to be rough, but most of the 100k was paved, then we turned right to go to Windjana Gorge. Now that road was a different story!!! My delicate body has been shaken, jolted, battered & bruised in every area. My intrepid leader drove with the skill of Stirling Moss, but thank goodness not the speed. Windjana Gorge was worth it all. We, with, Tour Busses, campers, tourists of all ages read all the information signs and followed the trail into the a Gorge. The Kimberleys are a mountainous area with amazing rock formations.
We had to go through a short tunnel of rock before we saw the water.
Keep walking we were told, there are about 38 fresh water crocodile just lazing along the bank or floating around.
All the dark marks are crocodile
I did the 1k return trip (using a stick for this sort of walk) & Brian went a bit further on , but there was nothing different.
A successful 'selfie'
We had our lunch at picnic tables in the 34 degrees then set off for Tunnel Creek.
This was as we expected, to difficult for me and Brian didn't have the correct footwear ( you will be walking in water in the Tunnel. He had a good excuse. We read up on the big protracted battle between White & Aboriginal? One particular man used this tunnel as his hideout from Police but was eventually killed at the entrance on the other side of the mountain. I had a good excuse for not even attempting it.....there were 2 Ambulances & a Volunteer Emergency Service vehicle in the parking lot.
The day before a person had a broken leg, there had been another one in the morning and now they were going in to get another patient (don't know what for)
Now we had to face the 170k back THE SAME WAY!!!.
Passed a ute & camper on the side of the road, broken front axle, they had already contacted help.
I am convinced that Dinosaur walked this area......here is the 'poo' to prove it.
Actually they are Termite mounds of all size and shapes.
Our beautiful Izusu doesn't look as if it is loved any more.
Today was another round of sight seeing, the wharf at low tide
Now I will show youths end of the day, high tide
It's like the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia. Amazing. Canada has 15 meter tides, here is only 11 meters
We went to the Prision Boab Tree, it was where they tied Aboriginal men prior to building prisons. Not a nice story.
This Biab tree is though to be around 1500 years old.
Near this area is the longest water trough because it was where cattle rested to be watered and fed before being shipped out at the port.
During WW11 this was also a base for Soldiers defending Australia. & we say the 6foot square concrete swimming pool that made for themselves.
On our travels we got 'lost' in the dessert!!
Just another thing to try. Much nicer than the trip to Windjara Gorge!
Well our stay in Derby is over, I'm stocked up for at least 6 nights free camping near Broome on the road to Cape Laveque. No communication for that time unless we go into Broome.
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