Letter 4 from Huw Kingston on his way to Darwin
Read Letter 1: Perth to Carnarvon
Read Letter 2: Carnarvon to Broome
Read Letter 3: Update from Drysdale River Homestead
Hello All,
Sunday 6th July
A slightly more relaxed, less rushed update coming to you courtesy of the ranger station at Purnululu National Park, the home of the Bungle Bungles and, as from a week ago, now inscribed on the list of World Heritage sights (Australia's 15th).
Just across the park lies the Northern Territory border, so a few days ofwalking/dragging/riding/pushing/carrying the mountain bike (and BOB Trailers) should see Wayne and I out of Western Australia.
Let's get back to kayaking along the Kimberley coast. Our heads are still full of the paddling experience, even though we've been off the water for 2 weeks now. The paddle certainly baptised us with fire. On day 3 we were sitting on an island in the middle of Sunday Strait, known as the area with the strongest tidal flows on the Australian coast. The wind was howling and all around us the sea was a patchwork of whitewater rapids, swirling whirlpools, whitecaps. It was an awesome sight. The tides were moving towards the springs (the next few days would see an increase in power). That afternoon we got lucky with a window of opportunity to go before the tides
turned against us, the wind dropped and we finally got across Sunday Strait.
Over the coming days we started to get a handle of the tides, picking when we could go and when we had to wait. Indeed it was a feature of our jouney that we 'went with the flow' and we came to enojy the enofrced relaxation. Some days we might not leave until lunchtime, others we'd be away at dawn and finished by late morning. Others we'd paddle for 8 hours or more. And whenever we thought we'd got the measure of things, the Kimberley would throw us a curly one. Like paddling out of a feature called the Drain near
Koolan Isalnd. We timed our run to perfection and were busy congratulating each other, when we found ourselves being swept backwards at a great rate of knots. Only 30mins of shoulder killing mad paddling pulled us back out of the flow. Or on the last week or so, thinking we could predict things ('Well Wayne, there may be some dangers in the Kimberley but generally they're predictable - the tidal streams, the fact that the wind gets up in the morning but always dies in the afternoon.....'). The wind howled night
and day. On my 40th birthday I celebrated with a tent full of sand - the insect mesh had sieved the sand, depositing a cm of the finest sand on us as we slept (or tried to). Big seas crashed against the rocks of Cape Voltaire
and waves rose from nowhere on unseen reefs.Not a bad place for middle age to set in. Wayne had even carried a couple of cans of Guinness in for the occasion. This followed a half dozen bottles of Crown lager handed over in a bag of ice by a cruise boat the previous evening.
Every corner offered another scene, every night a perfect beach to camp on. Water was always an issue, even more so because of the particularly poor wet season earlier in the year. We were less inclined to poke up mangrove lined creeks for fear of too many encounters with the snapping handbags. But we could carry 4 pr 5 days at a time, and got water from the odd spring or pearl farm.
Fishing was another issue. We'd been led to believe that dangling a bare hook in the waters would net us a fine feed every night.
The comment made to me once of 'if you can't catch fish in the Kimberley you shouldn't be there' kept ringing in my ear as our haul was less than bountiful. Trailing a lure, I'd either pull in tiny morsels or some monster would grab the line, tow me backwards then snap the line. We'd envisaged gorging on fish every night. The reality was nibbling every few days.We bumped into Malcolm Douglas over a number of days (the only boat we saw in the one week) and he came to the rescue on a few ocassions (Malcolm runs a croc farm in Broome but is well known for his documentaries on the Kimberley). He was out doing some filming. The first night we were camped on a beach when they came by. Our fsihing had failed us that afternoon. I watched as they threw a line into the water twice and both times came up with good sized fish. Bastards! If you can't catch 'em, eat someones else's
- so we joined them for dinner, then the following morning went out on the boat while they caught us some for lunch! Malcolm provided some can't fail lures too. They didn't - they're the ones that nearly capsized my kayak!
Malcolm also put a water drop in for us further down the coast, but the best bit of luck was the film. One morning, on another island paradise, I was bemoaning to Wayne that I was going to run out of slide film - the Kimberley was fast chewing up my supply. 30mins later, Malcolm's boat came onto our beach. 'Anything you guys need today?'. 'Yeah some slide film would be good' I replied, totally unexpectingly. 'What sort do you use?' came the reply. 'Geez, I don't care but I normally use Velvia' 'Sure, will 3 rolls
be enough?'. Shopping Kimberley style!We were going to be eaten, if not by crocs then by sharks was the general view of everyone in WA. As it turned out we only had one real croc encounter (and a few shark bumps) where one followed one afternoon and the following morning.
Tiny snippets from a month of wonder. We left our kayaks at Kimberley Coastal Camp on 22nd June after being looked after in luxury at this remote camp with fly in/fly out only access. $8000 for one week, nothing for us, in a week of no guests. Kay and Peter gave us a very contrasting but very welcome finish to the paddle.
Our bikes had made it to the rangers at Mitchell Falls and after a couple of days looking at aboriginal art sites with them and sorting gear we tackled some 'orrible corrugated roads. It was with some rear end relief that we left the Gibb River Road to follow quiet station tracks to here. Classic MTB touring on narrow winding tracks through real mountain country - rocky peaks up to 1000m in height. Night times down to 6 degrees shocked the body clothed only in warm weather gear. We ran out of food this last week so
were peckish when we reached the Bungles last night! We even saw 20km of sealed road yesterday, the only bit between Broome and Timber Creek; some 1500km. And the bit where I had more punctures than any other!Into the last 4 weeks, and Darwin hopefully on the 31 July. Not long before the finish we'll ride past the spot where Sean Fitzgerald had his MTB accident resulting in him becoming a quadraplegic and us starting the 4Wheels4Sean charity. I spoke with Sean today. 3 weeks ago, Steph and he received the specially adapted vehicle we've been raising $50000 for as the first objective. Sean told me it has totally changed their life. The abilityt o do the thnigs we all take for granted - spontaneously drive off to see friends or to go out for a coffee without the huge expense and organization of special taxis. One unexpected bonus is that Sean can actually see out of
the window in the car which he can't in the taxis so has seen, for example, the devastation the January bushfires wreaked on Canberra for the first time around his house. Thanksa again to those of you who have been part of this.The fund continues, so make a contribution (it's not too late to sponsor me for this trip -check out the website). It could so easily be one of us who needs assistance.
Thanks for the support.
Cheers
Huw