Katherine 2/8/15
Finally Internet again - so this one is a big one. Sorry
After a night in a free camp just outside of Katherine we met up with Kaynan, a friend of ours from Brisbane, for coffee. He just scored a job as a pilot doing the mail-runs out of Katherine and hopefully his test flight on Monday will all go well.
We stocked up on supplies and then went for another swim in the Katherine hot springs, which we knew well from our first visit. Soon it was time to start heading west on the Victoria highway towards WA. We stayed on a popular free camp and had a good night talking to a fellow Bushtracker owner. We also talked to a woman, pushing a wheelbarrow around Australia. She is trying to raise funds and awareness for Lifeline, a charity you can call when you have mental health issues or thinking of suicide.
Gregory NP 3/8/15
After our usual slow start we headed off towards Gregory National Park, about 300km west of Katherine. We got the first impression of Kimberley like landscapes just before the Victoria River Roadhouse. Magnificent red rock escarpments and soft mountains toped with big rocks. We should have stayed at the roadhouse, I’m sure the setting sun would have been magical. It was just before midday and we decided to do the Escarpment walk in 33C heat. Sarah was tired from the beginning and so she stayed at the first lookout together with Regine, while I hiked the more difficult track to the top of the escarpment. I got a fantastic view down onto the Roadhouse, the Victoria River, the mountains and escarpments around.
After lunch we drove further towards Timber Creek to check in at a Caravan park. We met up again with Matt, Caz and the kids and we all had fun to watch the crocodile feeding and especially the feeding of the 20+ kites. It was amazing to see them dive down to pick up the morsels thrown into the air. Sarah even ran onto the field to try and catch one of the kites, so she could pet it…
Gregory NP
We would have loved to drive into Gregory National Park, the second biggest in the Territory, however it is only accessible for seriously prepared 4WD enthusiasts. Also Caravan’s aren’t permitted and so we just did some of the lookouts along the main road.
First, we left our caravan behind and went to the Policemans lookout. It’s a nice spot on the bend of the Victoria River with a little island in the middle and lots of bird life.
After hooking up our caravan again, we dragged it up to some more lookouts on top of the escarpments overlooking Timber Creek and Victoria River.
Further on the Highway we found a bridge across Victoria River that is not on any map. It’s a full size double lane car bridge with locked gates on the other side of the river. It must lead into some restricted area. Nevertheless it provided a good platform to take some more photos of the river.
A short drive later we headed down a dirt road to see ‘Gregory’s Tree’, a big boab tree on the bank of the river. It’s a sacred site for Aboriginals and Augustus Gregory, the explorer, engraved it with his arrival date on the 2nd July 1856.
By now it was already lunchtime and we’ve only managed to drive about 20km from Timber Creek. We decided to drive to Saddle Creek, a free campsite about another 100km away. The country got a lot flatter, but we could still see some ranges on the side, as well as more and more boab (bottle) trees.
Saddle Creek camp side is situated just beneath a spectacular mountain that looks – who would of guessed it – like a saddle. Plenty of other campers here – one even had a live goose on board. Sarah quickly made friends with the girl ‘next door’ and soon they were climbing a dead tree in the center of the camp. And once again a stunning red sunset and a clear sky to watch the stars.
Zebra Rock Mine 5/8/15
A windy, fresh morning and a happy long chat with Sarah’s new friends parents Suzanne and John (with Haley & Kate) we all drove off together towards Zebra Rock, the one and only operating zebra rock mine in the world.
We went through the gallery and display, Sarah, Kate and Haley ‘fossicked’ a couple of stones and all three kids went of to polish them at the outside tables using the provided water and sandpaper. The stones need to be sanded to give them a good shape, smooth edges and the shiny surface. The four parents happily continued the chat from the morning but after an hour Haley’s family decided to continue further on to another campground located at Lake Argyle. We exchanged our blog-addresses and said our good-byes and spend a quiet afternoon reading and playing. Later on we listened to a talk about the unique zebra rock fossicking and the history of the mine. Zebra rock was known to locals to be in the Lake Argyle region, but with the building of the dam wall the known reefs all but one went under. They excavated as much as they could before it all went under water and so most zebra rock sold today comes out of storage and there is a finite supply. Kim, the owner of this mine, grew up on a station around the lake and he was searching for 14 years until he found another reef on dry land and opened his own mine about 6 years ago together with wife Ruth. There is only very little zebra rock there. About 50m x 2m x 0.3m. That’s it. No more zebra rock is known on this planet.
Zebra rock looks a bit like sediment layers, however it’s one solid rock. Not just layers. There are also a lot of rocks with some bubble pattern. Geologists still don’t know how it was formed. All they know is that it is about 1.2 Billion years old and must have been superheated (i.e Volcano) at one point. Some stripe patterns are so regular that they can even put a mathematical formula to it.
We’ve visited the site the next morning and we were allowed to take some pieces home :-) For us to polish.
That evening I left the girls behind and went for a sunset cruise on Lake Argyle. Max, our tour guide was fantastic and the scenery and the sunset was breathtaking. I better let the pictures speak, as I simply don’t have the words to describe it.
Keep River NP 6/8/15
We left the Zebra mine around midday after our mine tour and some scones and complimentary coffee from the shop. We didn’t pump the tires as we only drove about 10km on bitumen until we hit the gravel road into Keep River National Park.
We stopped at the Cockatoo Lagoon next to the Ranger Station, but Sarah had fallen asleep on the gravel road, so Regine only went there briefly to take some pictures. After another 15km we parked the caravan at the first campsite within the park and then went for a hike another 12km up the road. Apparently Aborigines used the rock overhangs as shelter, however there is very little to see apart from some shell grid, accumulated over thousands of years (i.e the dump).
However our campsite was an absolute gem - there was a little walk that we did in the morning with some bungle-bungle like formations. Spectacular. What a beautiful little National Park!