Mornington Wilderness Park and Bell Gorge

Speed blogging - our third catch up post! We booked our car in a for service at 7am in Broome. While waiting, Tony is trying to catch the blog up with our travels. 

The Mornington Wilderness Park is about 90km south of the Gibb River Road. It was a 300,000Ha cattle station which was purchased by the Australian Wildlife Conservancy and de-stocked. We saw the effect of this along Annie Creek 10m from our campgroud where Julia saw rare purple crowned fairy wrens (I believe that is worth bragging rights!. The campsite and park were fantastic. Unfortunately a rouge dingo has become too familiar with campers (I think it will be "removed" soon). We looked after our food and shoes, but she got into our warm gear bag and ate our feather sleeping bag. The tent is scattered with feathers every time we use it.

A mighty Boab tree. I think the nearest relatives of this tree are in South Africa.

Tinsel the dingo comes for a night visit. We certainly did not feed her - unless down feathers count.

Sir John Gorge on the Fitzroy River.

Laura opening gates on the road.

Canoeing in Dimond Gorge. We limited our travels because of un-seasonal blustery winds which were funneled into the Gorge walls.

Playing in the cliffs on the side of the Gorge.

A metre wide pocket of rock carved out by this giant pebble. Every year the river floods in the wet season, and there was plenty of evidence of ice smooth rocks and debris high in the trees near the river.

Laura airborne.

After three great nights in Mornington we drove through to Windjana Gorge via Bell Gorge.

Julia and Laura under the falls. The water was freezing - but you can't not swim!

Above the falls at Bell Gorge.

Mt Elizabeth Station and Manning Gorges GRR

The second in a quick few blogs. We have just emerged back onto the "grid".

After El Questro we drove West across the famed Pentacost River (a gentle crossing bu August!) and a few hundred kms to Mt Elizabeth Station which has two gorges to visit with some excellent Aboriginal art.

The Pentacost River crossing.

Classic red dirt.

The Gorge on the station.

Filling up @2.50 a litre at Mt Barnett Roadhouse (the next Roadhouse only sells diesel!).

The kids in a pull along ferry that is used on the walk to Upper Manning Gorge.

Laura under the falls at Upper Manning Gorge.

The gorge from the top of the falls.

Laura, making a splash.

El Questro - Gibb River Road

We made it across the Gibb River Road. A rough dirt road that runs 500km from Kununurra to Derby. A number of large (300K Ha) cattle stations run camp sites (and resorts!). The first and most famous is El Questro where we stayed for four nights. The private campsite had a long swimming hole - which was great - until we learned it was 100m on the wrong side of the line they deem safe from Salties. Ooops. 

Zebedee Springs is a creek in the rainforest with water warmed by hot rocks in the earth..

Emma Gorge. We swum out and under the waterfall. There was warm water flowing out of a cliff here as well.

Lachlan and Oliver, new mates who we paralled for a few weeks.

El Questro Gorge.

Amazing palms in the gorge.

You have to swim this hole (big sacrifice!) to reach the upper half of the Gorge.

Kids doing a horse riding lesson at ELQ.

Chamberlain Gorge at ELQ. A salt water croc lives in this one.

Stunning country. Branco's lookout, one of the fab manicured 4WD tracks.We had an ugly time on an un-manicured track at another station. Oh my!

Back to Zebedee Springs at 7am on our last day. With Dr Evil.

Bungle Bungles

The Bungles are about five hours south of Kununurra in WA. About 2km of the earths crust has eroded in the past 360 million years leaving these remarkable landforms exposed. It was fantastic. Photos below. 

We have returned to K. and pleased to find a new stone guard waiting (to reduce the chance of a rear window/panel damage from rocks ricocheting off the the trailer). We left our mangled original in Darwin. To give you an idea of how remote we are, it would have been $80 cheaper to send it from BNE to Broome opposite ends of the country). We hope the RACQ wears the $510 back in Brisbane! Also very pleased that the local Toyota shop found 15 minutes to re-attach an about-to-fall-off side mirror. They are like hospitals for cars.. one couple was having their car shipped back to Melbourne for repairs.  We are feeling very lucky as we head off onto the famous Kimberly mecca called the Gibb River Road. We should re-emerge in about two and a half weeks in Fitztroy crossing. This is our next laundry and rest-stop. We hope the caravan park has a pool! Based on our experience so far, there may even be wi-fi along the way.

Thanks everyone for your comments on our prior blogs.

I have updated the Map of our travels, you have to scroll down the panel on the LHS and click on page 2 to see our most recent tracks.

 

We visited Echidna chasm, and impossibly sharp fracture line in the rocks. At midday (solar) the sun shone directly into the chasm lighting it up with a orange glow. Even the digital natives thought it was more impressive than an ipad!

Approaching the western scarp. The last 50km of the road is rough with a few creek crossings. Very exciting. 

Lovely looking, but scratchy and spiky spinifex grass. 

At Walardi campground.

Termite nest!

Walking up Cathedral Gorge in the south section of the park.

The dry river beds with scoured bases give an idea of how much water must flow here in the "wet".

Squirty bottle fight!

The bower bird nest in Echidna chasm.