Well I must start by apologising for missing last month's newsletter I was caught out by the early date of the meeting, so I have a lot to bore you with this month. We went out to Tom Price an oasis in the desert which is a mining town and the gateway to the Karajini National Park. A most spectacular park in fact driving through the ever-changing Hammersley Ranges is mesmerising. We returned to the coast and went to Eighty Mile Beach renowned for the shells washed up on shore, we went shell hunting and were rewarded with a box full of shells it's one of those things we couldn't resist, that one more shell. We did try fishing here as well but only caught catfish, fun to catch but not so good to eat. We went on to Broome. It has been 28 years since we were here, we expected to see a lot of change and were overwhelmed by the amount of development not only in Broome but in all of northern Western Australia. This is where we first encountered limits on alcohol purchased in northern Australia, with varying regulations in all of the towns we went through. We left the van in storage and went up Cape Leveque at this time there were protesters along the road wanting to stop a huge gas plant being developed in the area. We went to the aquaculture complex at One Arm Point. It was well presented and informative especially the Barramundi feeding, the tides in this are huge the water was rushing in, we walked out on a sand bar and had to race the tide in. We camped next to the Willie Creek Pearl farm the showroom had some very nice pearls but as usual the one I liked was $3,000 a little over my budget. This is where we were successful in beach fishing, bringing in salmon, which I consider one of the nicest eating fish we have caught. We then went to Derby and found out those tides at 10 metres are the highest in Australia and the second highest in the world (Nova Scotia is the highest). We had intended to go in to the Kimberleys but the road to Kalumbaru had been washed out in the last cyclone. It washed out the road with holes big enough to swallow our car and that was the only place we needed to see so on we went. We stopped at Wamun an aboriginal community across the road it was also destroyed in the cyclone they are getting new housing now. We stopped at Kununurra, we had to revisit the Ord River Rum distillery and bring home supplies for the cellar. We put the boat in and went up river to a beautiful gorge, with the amount of water up here as the river narrowed the current was stronger and we were going nowhere up stream at 3/4 throttle. Needless to say the Ivanhoe crossing was closed as the water rushed over with white caps. We stopped at the lookout over the Victoria River at Timber Creek and had the place to ourselves, a change, there are so many people in the north at this time of year. We stopped at Katherine and then headed north to Darwin, when you have time there are little places to explore Umbrawarra Gorge out from Pine Creek and Pine Creek so full of history. Paul had chosen Daly River as the fishing spot to catch Barramundi and we tried and tried but ended up learning we were unprepared for Barramundi fishing losing the ones that did take the hook, the other fishers are generous giving us their surplus fish Paul has a photo of barramundi but don't let him tell you he caught them, he didn't catch the fish. I had been looking forward to going to Litchfield National Park and was not disappointed with the beautiful waterfalls and swimming holes. We were lucky not to lose the lens for the camera as we left it on the ground at a popular swimming hole and drove off. When we stopped for another photo we realised we had left it behind when we returned it was still there. We took a side trip to Dundee Beach we could look across the Arafura Sea, a scenic spot also with high tides, we also went to Mandurah across the bay from Darwin we sat here on the ferry jetty fishing but the tide was going out and here we go with excuses again, no fish at least we still have Barramundi in the freezer. We went to the Mary River and out to Stuarts Point where Stuart made the north coast a highlight for me. we are now in Darwin with 12 days to look around before our flight to Bali. Barbara & Paul Disclaimer : please note |