Kununurra – Karratha

Hi,

It was our intention to do again a scenic flight (to see Lake Argyle, the Bungle Bungles and the Argyle Diamond mine, but we decided not to it because the flight takes more than 2.5 hours and we don’t think Tim will do it better than last time . Next to Kununurra you have the Mirima National Park that claim to have the mini Bungle Bungles. And indeed they have 2 kind of Bungle Bungles domes in the park; it made us happy ;). Because Kununurra is a agriculture environment thanks to damming the Ord River and Lake Argyle we did a agricultural tour and skipped Windham

In Kununurra campground I found a flyer of a 1.5 hour scenic fight with a water plane –from Derby- to the Horizontal Falls in the Buccaneer Archipelago. These ‘waterfalls will exist when seawater is pushed through a small channel in combination with the extreme tide difference in this region (apparently on of the highest tidal movements in the world). So up to Derby!

On our way to Derby we visit Halls Creek and Fitzroy Crossing.

Driving through Australia itself gives you already a vacation feeling. The roads are good, great scenery till the horizon and no traffic jams. The only traffic you meet are people from the south who are heading north for their hibernation. Zippers (bypass operation), Gray nomad (pension) are some of the names for these travelers with their tow caravan and big four-wheel drive Nissan Patrol (of other 4wd Asian brand) including an boot on the roof of their car.

Halls Creek itself is not shocking same as Fitzroy Crossing. Both a lot of Native Australians on the street hanging around a tree or supermarket. Halls Creek is the town to the south entry of the Bungle Bungles. Fitzroy Crossing is the thon to Geikie Gorge National Park. In Fitzroy Crossing we did an Aboriginal tour on the Geikie Gorge through where the Fitzroy river flows. In the past (350 million years) the Gorge was a reef system. We also did got some lessons in the family traditions of the Aboriginals, which give you an other (more understandable) view of today’s native Ozzie’s. Geikie Gorge is worth visiting (see pictures)

And Derby, I would say skip Derby

In the Visitors Centre we heard that the two scenic flight operators had irregular flights because it was still April, the season starts in May. She also told us that the flights plan was changes a couple of times during the last 2 week. After ringing both tour operators we heard that one will do a flight next week and the other had change his tour from 3 to 6 hours (flight, power jet boat, fishing and flight again) so … no scenic flight for us ?. To overcome this disappointment we went to the town pool and see the famous Derby jetty twice; with low and with high tide. Beside that jetty, they also have lots of sand flies thanks to the big mud plain.

In Broome there is enough to do so staying some days is recommended. Here they don’t have a low and peak season, most of the good attractions where already fully booked days before we came in town. And the natural attractions like the ’stairway to heaven’ and the by low tide visible dinosaur footprints where not visible anymore. BTW the ’stairway to heaven’ can be watched between Derby and Karratha as long as you have some empty mud plains, low tide and full moon. Beside the precious Cable Beach and other self guided attractions incl. great mango ice cream and liquor on a mango farm, we did the famous Broome Camel ride and an Astro-tour. The Astro-tour was fantastic. See some great stars from both the Southern & most of the northern Hemisphere like the Moon, Southern Cross, Saturn, Uranus, Jewel Box and more. Only the next day my whole back looked like the Moon. Although I had a long sleeve pants and sweater (with 30 degrees) and I covered me fully with insect repellent; except my back ?

Frome several people we heard the “Eighty Mile Beach” or ‘Eety Bijl Niets’ the way Tim pronounce it was nice but not spectacular. A huge camping with (according to one of the annual visitors this year for the first time) a huge amount of flies. (see the picture with the anti-fly cage). You can fight against sand flies with repellent, but normal flies…. nose, mouth ears, eyes…. Brrrrr.

Although we would like to see a huge big mine (like Tome Price) we thought it would be nicer for Tim to see big ships and other big machinery and it saved us about 700 kilometres.

Via Port Hedland and Point Samson we arrived (April 29th) in Karratha. In all these three peninsula’s they have a huge port of transhipment for iron ore. Most of the ships have Asia (China & Japan) as their destination. In Karratha they also have a port of transhipment for industrial salt and natural gas(destination mainly Asia). The trains that brings the iron ore to these ports come from the 10 iron ore mines in the neighbourhood (3-500 km) and are about 210 carriages long = about 2.4 kilometres long. In Karratha we visit the port side of Pilbara ore which is part of Rio Tinto. It was a really interesting and fascination tour.

Before the weekend of May 4-7 we would like to be in Exmouth for the WhaleShark Festival.

Till soon
John, Lia & Tim