Chrissy & Xav

 We had planned to dive today but the dive was cancelled due to an insufficient number of other divers booking onto the trip. This was our only chance to head out to Murion Island so we are very disappointed. Since we are still eager to get into the water, we booked in for an afternoon dive at Navy Pier. We dove this site last time we were here and it had an astonishing amount of marine life, although no coral.

Today we had an early start as it was whaleshark day. Actually, we had an even earlier start than expected because a number of loud vehicles exited the campground at ~5am, presumably to line up at Cape Range National Park in the hopes of being allocated one of the few campsites that are vacated every day. At least we were ready with plenty of time to spare to meet the boat.

We had planned today as a diving day but none of the operators are going out today so instead we headed to the beach, although a different beach this time. This beach, near our camping spot at Yardie Homestead, was phenomenal. The sand was so soft, water so warm, and we had the entire place to ourselves. Frenchy did a bit of snorkeling while Chrissy played with Pepper on the beach. We also saw a lot of turtles in the water.

After a late start, we spent today at the beach. The three of us really enjoyed the warm water and soft sand. It was also good to relax a bit after our two big days of driving.

We had planned to do a lot of diving here but it seems that will be an issue. Two of the dive companies are not planning to do any dives over the next few days, except a shore dive at the Navy Pier that we have done before.

We woke up this morning to the sound of road trains roaring past and the smell of The Stench. This is definitely the worst campsite we have been in so far and we have been in some bad ones! With the aid of daylight we were able to pinpoint the likely source of The Stench. There was a blackwater dump point in the camping spot (caravan poo dump for those who aren’t familiar with the terminology). We didn’t see it the night before but this morning there was a queue of caravans eager to unload and release The Stench upon us.

Unfortunately we had to leave Broome today due to our revised schedule. We made today a big driving day as we did this same route two years ago and didn’t feel the need to stop anywhere along the way. We actually drove until ~7pm and then started looking for a place to stop.

The only places to stop were  rest area style camp spots and so we ended up at one of those, but a sad one, not near a river or with any trees.

We have decided to make today decision day. We finally must decide what we want to do for the rest of our trip. Certainly we do not want to cross the middle and subject ourselves to another month of nothing as we have had our fill of nothing. However, we could drive back to Sydney across the south or we could sell the car in Perth and fly to Paris early.

Broome lacks internet cafes and cafes with internet access. In fact the only “café” with internet is the McCafe (yes Maccers) and the only internet café is the community centre which has no food or drinks and so is not really a café.

After dropping Nicole, Martjin, and Eric at the airport for their flights out, Chrissy and Frenchy decided it was time to change campgrounds. So they left the open, crowded youth club for the calm shade of the pistol club. They set themselves up under some shady trees and departed for the beach, eager to avoid seeing what Pepper would do once shooting practice began.

Today the entire day was spent at the beach swimming, reading, playing with Pepper, and relaxing. Mostly it was spent playing with Pepper as she becomes possessed by a demanding, barking, water friendly maniac when she hits the beach.

Today was not at all well planned. Chrissy and Frenchy needed to do some laundry and luckily Eric was more than happy to assist by providing access to his washer and dryer. However this meant that they couldn’t really go off and do anything for more than ~1 hour. So the day itself was a massive waste of time until dinner time. For dinner, the four of us went with Eric and two of his friends to a fabulous bistro on cable beach and enjoyed both fine food and wine – a nice way to end our time with Martjin and Nicole.

Everyone woke up tired this morning. Martjin and Nicole were forced to sleep with their heads under their pillows and blankets due to their proximity to the flemmy chainsaw. Frenchy was unbelievably cold. Chrissy had seat belts and buckles poking her in the back – although she did manage to be out cold by morning.

Martjin woke after his bad night in need of a tea or coffee.

Today we decided to head for Broome a day ahead of schedule. We had already seen everything we wanted to see on Gibbs River Road and anyway all the gorges were starting to run together in our minds. Also since Martjin’s brother is currently working with Broome we thought it would be nice to meet up with him and spend some time in civilization.

Calling a small, remote town like Broome civilization is definitely a bit of a stretch, but compared to many of the places Chrissy and Frenchy have been thus far it qualifies as civilization.

Our first task this morning was securing a better campsite. Luckily a group that had been camped on the best spot overlooking the river left this morning so we picked up our tents and tables and moved everything over before heading off for the day.

The first stop today was at Tunnel Creek National Park.

We spent today visiting Bell Gorge.  There was a bit of a walk to the actual gorge, including walking across a rocky river. Nicole, Chrissy, and Frenchy took off their shoes to make the crossing. Martjin decided to jump across to spare himself from having to remove his hiking boots. However, he did not quite make the jump and ended up falling into the river, soaking his clothes, shoes and part of his backpack.

Despite today being kayaking day we had a bit of a slow start due to the wine from the night before. We finally made it to the kayaking gorge ~10am. As we were not planning to spend the night at Old Mornington, we decided to go wild and take the dingo kayaking with us.

We had a bit of trouble loading the dingo into the kayak. She kept jumping out and heading for shore. Finally we convinced her to sit still for long enough to shove off and head out.

We spent today exploring Old Mornington’s gorges and swimming holes. They really were spectacular, especially as we only saw ~12 other people the entire day. There were so few people we even took the dingo with us for a bit of swimming and exploration. We were all having a fine time when one odd Victorian commenting, addressing the dingo “What are you doing here. I don’t think you are supposed to be here”. Of course the dingo only responded with frantic tail wagging and the rest of us pretended we hadn’t heard him but spent the rest of the afternoon fearing this busybody would report us.

We had a bit of a rude awakening this morning in the form of a tour bus parking right next to the big tent. Despite there being a few other suitable parking spots, away from us and our campsite, this rude Western Explorer bus driver parked his group of yelling, chattering, annoying tourists within touching distance of our tent. We guessed this group would spend ~1 hour total visiting the gorge, including the 15 minute walk from our campsite to the gorge.

In our original plan for this part of the trip we had considering either going up the Mitchell Plateau past the falls or heading up the more northern part of the track towards Honeymoon Bay. After the rough ride yesterday we decided to do neither and headed south towards Gibbs River Road.

We stopped for burgers at Drysdale Station.

Today’s plan was to drive to Mitchell Falls for the day and return to the same camping spot for the night. Frenchy and Chrissy had been told by people they met earlier in the trip that camping at Mitchell Falls was not very nice and that it was better to do the whole thing as a day trip. Given that the only thing to do at the falls was a 3.5km walk this seemed like a sensible decision.

Today was a big driving day. In fact, other than driving there really wasn’t anything else on the agenda. Our only stops today were to throw out the rubbish and to refuel at Drysdale Station. We had thought that we would take a scenic flight over Mitchell Falls out of Drysdale Station but the flights were $330 per person so we decided to skip it.

After Drysdale Station the road became heavily corrugated and incredibly boring.

We spent today visiting the gorges around El Questro Station. Our first stop was to the hot springs, which provided a scenic, hot natural spa once we managed to secure a spot among the many people visiting the springs. Although we were told school holidays had ended for all states there were a lot of children running around. Luckily we generally managed to keep them out of our spot – the warm water certainly didn’t need any further warming.