Bungled
Posted: November 30, 2012 Filed under: Australia, Landscapes | Tags: Australia, Australian native flora, Broome, Camping, landscapes, NT, outback, Travel (2) Leave a comment
Bungle Road
The Bungle Bungle National Park is one of those places I’ve saved up. It hasn’t been on the way anywhere, and was part of the decision to take the route we did back to Perth. I envisaged much photography, angles, light changes, vistas, dawns and dusks. You know where this is going. We arrived at the entrance to the National Park, and barely slowing to 40 to dump the trailer, hit the dusty trail to the Bungle Bungle World Heritage rock formation, Purnululu. A brain rattling 90 minutes later we met sunset at the park. At these times it is a blessing W sets an 8km walking pace. We had 60 minutes of daylight left and about 8km of trails to walk. Breaking into a breathy jog, I kept pace with the diminishing sherpa who had the camera and the keys, certain my brain was now pinballing around my skull with every footfall.
The face of Another-Incredible-World-Heritage-Listed-Natural-Wonder-Fatigue
I admit right here that that was all the time we gave the Bungles. Even as I look back now I think perhaps the heat got to me. Maybe I need to return.
Meanwhile, the driver fidgeted, revved, and Broome called.
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I love spinifex. Its ability to grow in rock, without water, to bounce back when flattened by fire. For such a soft looking plant, it is strikingly spikey. Between Purnululu and Broome I plotted to introduce a mass planting to our home garden. If anything could make a home between concrete tiles and arid sandiness, spinifex would be it.
spinifex regrowth
On the approach to Broome I once again discovered the paucity of available campground sites in NT campgrounds. Thundering past a newly established place 20 minutes out of Broome, I ordered the unthinkable. A u-turn. Brand new, modern, groovy, ablutions, kilometres of washing line, neighbours far enough away to be spared their symphony, and a communal fire-pit surrounded by generous characters offering education and home-made liquor (I learnt the difference between a bourbon and a scotch was simply the ‘flavour’ you add), made Broome’s Gateway unforgettable. And then we went one better.
We can thank friends living in Broome for recommending one of the best tours I have done hands down: Greg Quickes Astro Tour. I don’t hitch my wagon to tours as a rule, but this rocked. It wasn’t quite dusk as we enthusiastically make our way to a spot near a quarry a few KMs out of Broome. Luckily Greg had spotted Saturn and peering into the telescope, I saw what appeared to be a cut-out of Saturn. Checking the outside of the lens for a sticker, I looked again. Back to Greg. Back to the telescope. And here is where my artistic brain strains to wrap around the idea that the sky is blue but in the telescope it is black. I blame the 4WD brain air hockey. As other people arrived for the tour, they took turns peering at Saturn. Without fail, every person looked. Pulled back. Asked if it was sticker. Looked again. And the tour began. Multi-coloured jewels, millions of stars filling the viewfinder, navigating south by the southern cross, the Milky Way. No horoscope sign omitted, no question left unanswered. As the mercury plummeted to an eerie 14, (Broome was still 26) coats appeared and hot chocolate administered, I realised the best tour we had done hadn’t actually moved from one spot. Do it.
Kakadu North
Posted: September 20, 2012 Filed under: Landscapes | Tags: Australia, Australian native flora, Camping, Gumnuts, Kakadu, Kakadu National Park, landscapes, Merl, NT, palms, Palms, roadtrip, Roadtrips 2 Comments
Seed pods, Merl Campground, Kakadu
Our time at Club Croc drew to a close, but we felt we had not plundered the full depth of Kakadu. We ventured North to the Merl campground where countless people told us we would be carried away by mosquitoes.
Palm seeds, post fire, Kakadu
Thundering along the road we heard a thump around the trailer. I was pretty certain no animal had met an untimely end so we concluded investigation would be in order. We paced around the trailer mystified, until I found a chain protected by heavy duty fabric dangling jauntily from the frame of the trailer. “What’s this for?”, I asked, swinging it around my finger. W said he hadn’t noticed it before. At about the same time we realised it was dangling from the spot where the spare tyre used to be, and 2 seconds later noted a black scrape on a corner of the trailer. Clearly suffering the same brain rattling experience I endured on the 4WD roads, the spare had made a bid for freedom, glancing off the metal case where the fridges live, and bouncing off into the underbrush. We immediately jumped in the car and retraced our steps, drawing to a halt at the point of ejection, behind a guy in a minivan beating a hasty retreat. We never recovered the tyre but were richer for the knowledge of where the wrapped safety chain should have been employed.
Ubirr rock plateau kakadu
Out of our remote camp ground we realised Kakadu is teeming with gorges and swimming holes filled to the waterline with backpackers, parents, and peeing youth conveyed via bus. Worse than Bondi on a filming day, all I could think about was the poor little freshwater crocs hiding at the bottom waiting for everyone to go home. I realised THIS was the Kakadon’t people talk about.
Undeterred, we took off up north where Kakadu borders Arnhem Land and an “All hands in the boat!!” cruise up the East Alligator River, allows you to appreciate the watchful golden eye of many a saltie at close range. At nearby Ubirr, rangers tell stories, and hundreds of people climb the nearby rock plateau in the movie footsteps of Crocodile Dundee who took Sue up there to show her ‘his territory’. Rounding off the day with a feast of unexpectedly fabulous authentic Thai food from the Border Store, we repaired to the campground to erect the tent just after sunset, when the mozzies were at their zenith.
Waving not drowning
East Alligator River, Kakadu/Arnhem Land
Emptying a can of pleasingly noxious flyspray into our sleeping quarters, I remained there until the inevitable odyssey to the ablutions block was upon me. Blithely wandering off into the dark without a torch, I spent 30 minutes circumnavigating the frustratingly organically planned campground. By the time I found our spot again, I had benefited from ribald snatches of german and french conversation as I passed, and lost the battle with mosquitoes the size of small birds.
Mamukala Wetlands Kakadu
The next morning, we squeezed in a trip to the Mamukala Wetlands, which I realise are what I have always thought Kakadu would look like everywhere. Swathes of water lillies and water birds were just too far away for me to get a great shot, but it certainly made me want to jump in a tinny and putt around.
Palm Seeds, Kakadu
As I see it 