The Gibb River Road

Up at 6am and drove the 37kms to Tunnel Creek (a Creek that’s excavated a tunnel – or is it a Creek that runs thru’ a tunnel?) Ensured that our torch worked properly before starting the wade thru as crocs are known to live there. Freshies that is. Not much to say really – saw a small piece of Aboriginal art at the other end but no real excitement. Briefly chatted to another couple at the entrance who seemed nice.

After packing up back at Windjana we drove to our next camp at Dog Chain Creek – a cracking little flattened patch of grass under a big old tree by the creek. And nobody else around too! Quickly set up the tent etc, the started the short (7km) drive to Leonard’s Gorge. Oh my God! The guide book described it as fairly rough, suitable for 4WD only – I’d describe it as bloody rough, suitable for helicopter only!! Nearly an hour just to get to the ‘car park’. The gorge was great though, even though we only had about 20 mins to appreciate it – not wanting to do the drive from hell in the dark.

Camping at Dog Chain was great – cooked tea, lit a fire and drank whiskey before bed. Oh yeah, we’re half way thru our trip now – eeek.

Drove to Bell Gorge this morning (can anyone spot at trend here) and suffered our first puncture on the GRR – and sods law, it had to be in the best of the 4 tyres! Ho hum, on with the spare.

At the entrance to Bell Gorge, we bumped into the couple that I mentioned yesterday. They seemed good value so we decided to camp together in the one spot. So, we set up camp and got chatting – they’re from Victoria, enjoy camping (obviously), on a 12 month trip, know an IT guy (like me) from Melbourne… hang on!, you can’t be!; you are? No way! Unbelievable! They turn out to be friends of my work collegue (Alistair Nelson) who actually suggested we meet up. That’s the second freaky event that’s happened to us – what a small world we live in.

So, we cooked up (with Fiona and Drew (a.k.a. Chippa)), cracked open a (good few) tinnies and chatted around a campfire – fantastic. Oh yeah, and listened to Pink Floyd and a bit of ‘Al-Duf-Banga’.

Woke reasonably early (after a good few beers last night and even a nip of whiskey) and immediately set off for Manning Gorge. Decided to swim / wade across the waterhole taking extreme care not to get the camera wet. After 30 mins or so walking, we dropped down into the gorge and dove straight in the black water (clear water, just black rocks underneath.) Then… cliff jumps of course! Just a couple of 4 or 5m jumps which we all did. Orla even did a dive and ended up with red legs.

After an hour or so exploring we headed back for a shower and a bit of scran. Then headed to Campbell Ck about 80kms down the road and pitched the tents near a big fallen tree … firewood! Drew got out the old Stihl and cut a few good chunks – oh well, may aswell get a fire going now. Had dinner before dark and chilled with a few beers. Am very impressed with Drew and Fiona’s portable hot plate.

Hot plate in use again for pancakes – mmmm, us bush campers eat well. Gathered up the unburnt logs and headed for Jacks Waterhole. Stopped just after the Durack river crossing (which was easy by the way) and explored a few possible campsites. Drew and I were keen to stay however the weight of opinion (the girls) suggested we continue on.

Jacks WH was closed due to bad floods a few years earlier. Bummer, now we were stuck for a campsite. After a few ‘if only’s’ we decided to push on to El Questro station near the end of the GRR. When we got our third puncture I was really wishing we’d stayed back at the Durack River. Ho hum at least we can change a wheel in under 10 mins now.

Once we reached El Questro I was glad we pushed on – we were greeted by a fridge of cold beer (albeit XXXX) and the campspot was perfect. Being Saturday they always throw a BBQ and one of the bushmen always ‘bung on a turn’. The BBQ was amazing hence we all ate way too much and then couldn’t drink much beer. Moved on to Jim Beam and Cola (sorry Dad) instead but faded out by midnight.