Half-lap Day 55: Keep River National Park -> Kununurra

Today is probably the halfway point of our trip, if we get home on the Friday before Tony gets back to work...

Caitlin wanted to get up and watch the sunrise from the top of the rock in the campground, so I made sure she was up in time and then I walked a little way in to the rocky area to watch the sunrise myself. I sat on Millie’s camel rock and enjoyed the peacefulness and the changing light. Again there were clouds but not as many as yesterday and there was some beautiful light on the cliff face. Caitlin enjoyed her spot too but said there was a tree in the way so the photos weren’t as good as she’d hoped.

Hanging around for the sunrise and to see if the sun got above the clouds meant that we didn’t really start breakfast until about 8.30. We ate and then started packing up. The kids played with their friends until they were ready to leave. They did some more painting and rock climbing and other games. After they left Caitlin spent a bit of time talking to the couple from the ranger station, and gave them some of the boab nuts she’d painted. Once I’d packed the car and trailer I went through our seats to make sure there was no fruit left anywhere – there’s very strict quarantine going into Western Australia along this road, because we’re going straight into an agricultural area that is free of disease and pests. I also went through Millie and LiAM’s collections of things that they’ve found and got rid of all the plants – the quarantine officials can search the car and trailer so it wasn’t worth trying to take anything through. I was doubtful that we’d be able to take the painted boab leaves and nuts, so we took lots of photos of them, and then put them in a bowl to ask at quarantine, and the kids knew that we might have to get rid of them.

We headed back out along the dirt road, filled up our water containers again, then back on the highway. I had been told there was a rubbish bin not far from the park entrance, but couldn’t find it, which meant we got to the quarantine station with all our stuff still with us. They wouldn’t take any general rubbish, but did take the bag that had our leftover fruit and peelings in it. We had to throw out the painted boab nuts and leaves too, which was quite disappointing even though we thought we were prepared for that. They searched through the stuff at my feet and our food tub in the trailer, and then we were cleared to go into Western Australia.

I had been feeling sad about leaving the Northern Territory, I love it there so much. Having those extra 2 days in Keep River National Park was a nice little bonus and I was ready to move on to WA.

I really want to see Lake Argyle and we tossed up whether we should go there first or go to Kunnanurra and come back later – we decided to head for town and get supplies and fuel and figure out what we want to do next and we can come back to the Lake when we are ready. We arrived in Kunnanura and rang a few caravan parks – the prices seemed quite high (up to $59 for an unpowered site) then rang one that was only charging $40. The reviews online were again mixed, people complaining about backpackers and permanent residents and dodgy amenities, other people saying it was the most lovely place they’d stayed and the amenities were great. So we figured that most people’s negative reviews haven’t really panned out in our experience, and we went to the Hidden Valley Tourist Park. We got a partly shady spot right in front of the National Park, with an entrance to a Park walk just down from us. It was hot, but we were able to set up in time to still have shade on us and got the awning up just in time so that we didn’t ever have to sit in the sun.

We went to the pool for a swim – a beautiful pool and the kids swam for ages. Tony and I had a quick dip then started figuring out what we want to do while we were here – wading our way through a pile of brochures and trying to look things up on the internet. We went back to the tent for lunch, and booked a morning cruise on Lake Argyle for Tuesday morning. Not as good apparently as the sunset cruise, but quite a bit cheaper and it will give us most of what we want to get from visiting the lake. It’s so easy to be tempted to spend more – given our limited budget though we’re happy to be able to do a greater range of things, by picking the less popular options when they seem good enough.

The kids spent the afternoon hanging around the tent, playing on the ipad or reading. Caitlin set up her tent and we chatted to our neighbours. Millie moved her chair over to join them while she had a drink. I talked to my brother on the phone for a while – getting some tips for our time on the WA coast, and hearing all about his new baby son. The girls and I went back to the pool for another swim, and LiAM and Tony went into town to get milk and supplies for dinner. The timezone change was weird – we’d gone back an hour and a half, so the afternoon seemed really long. When the sun set we were more than ready for dinner, but it was only 5pm. We ate not long after that anyway, as our body clocks weren’t going to wait until later just because the time on our phones had changed.

After dinner we finished setting up the beds and chatted for a while, then into bed to read Brisingr until Caitlin fell asleep. It was still warm, warmer than the last few nights have been, so will be interesting to see what the temperature is like here overall.

Half-lap Day 54: Keep River National Park

It was a pleasant temperature overnight – we kept the windows open although did need a blanket. We were all up early as we wanted to do the walk again at sunrise. Yesterday another family had arrived in a motorhome and came around to everyone saying that they’d be cooking pancakes in the morning and we could order some if we wanted to.  We’d thought about buying some pancakes for the kids, but the timing didn’t work out with a sunrise walk (they were cooking from 7 til 8, and sunrise is at about 7.30) so we gave the pancakes a miss (we can cook some ourselves when we get to a town and can buy some eggs).

The sky was a very promising red colour as we set off on the walk, but there were a lot of clouds low to the horizon so we only got sporadic splashes of sunlight on the rocks as we walked. It was still beautiful, and so cool to see the rocks become clearer as the light increased. I walked ahead with the older 2 this time and Millie and Tony followed. I took so many photos though that I was often pretty slow. When we reached the highest part of the walk we could see across to the escarpment and it took our breath away – a long cliff of the beehive type rocks, quite incredible. We hadn’t see it last night because the sun was behind the escarpment and the cliffs were in shadow. We sat up there for a while and soaked up the view.

Yesterday on the walk Tony’s phone had changed to Western Australian time, so we figured he must have got a little bit of signal on the high ground. He really wanted to put his footy tips in before the weekend, so he climbed up a bit higher to see if he could get signal this morning. He occasionally got 1 bar of signal but not enough to do anything useful. And when he came back down his phone was back on Northern Territory time…

Back to camp to have breakfast, and Tony set up a tarp on our awning poles so that we had some shade. Our tent hadn’t got as much morning shade as we’d hoped, and the awning wouldn’t help given the angle of the sun, so having a free standing shade shelter worked better, we could move the chairs and tables as the shade shifted. We decided to stay here for a 2^nd night, it was such a beautiful and peaceful place (and only $7.70 a night) and everyone was happy to just hang out for the day.

We had a very relaxed morning and played cards until we were hungry for lunch. I read several chapters of Brisingr while the kids listened and played on the iPad. The kids spent a lot of the afternoon playing with the kids from the pancake-cooking family. They were 7 and 5 and really loved playing with Caitlin and LiAM in particular. They climbed the rocks, painted boab nuts and leaves, crushed the boab nut powder and tried to roast the seeds, played role playing games, played with LiAM’s water pistol, and all had a really lovely time. Tony went for another walk, with my phone this time, to see if he could get phone signal, again with no luck. Caitlin rode her bike around the campsite road. LiAM and Millie looked at the ants and birds and plants and explored our immediate area in detail. I spent a lot of time reading and doing puzzles. Tony and I spent some time starting to figure out where we are going from here and what places we want to see. It was another very hot day and it was nice not to have to be anywhere or do anything much.

As the sun got lower in the sky Tony lit the fire again. Caitlin and Millie and I went to the end of the campground to watch the bright red sunset on the cliffs. We had rissoles and pasta for tea, very nice sitting around the campfire. It wasn’t cold enough to need a fire for warmth, but had cooled down enough so that it wasn’t uncomfortable in front of the fire. After tea the kids roasted some marshmallows, then we headed for bed (Caitlin in the tent again) and read more Brisingr.