When you are recounting your holiday tales to friends and colleagues and the Top 5 list begins to read as follows, people start to look at you like you are probably just making it all up to try to impress them:
- we traipsed through crocodile-infested mangroves in search of mud crabs,
- had a snake bite incident involving a rendezvous with the Flying Doctor,
- drove through a raging bushfire,
- scrambled around the bush in search of ancient rock art and found the alleged remains of a 1940s Japanese fighter plane, and
- travelled for hours along a wash-out riddled, occasionally disappearing and very boggy ‘road’ which was in fact closed, just for a short cut to Wyndham.
In all honesty, that was merely a handful of the tales from our very Vivid Adventure to the Kimberley in May. Although it all may sound ever so slightly alarming the results were an abundance of unique and amazing photo opportunities coupled with an exhilarating and pretty much life-changing experience.
My preconceptions of the Kimberley trip barely touched on the actual sights, sounds and dramas that unfolded as our journey developed. Gorges were expected. Beaches were expected. Even crocodiles were expected. But the extremity and majesty of the location can only be fully understood first hand from moments such as finding yourself sat alone (with your tripod) on an age-old dry river bed molded by centuries of torrential rain surrounded by sandstone beehive domes stretching as far as the eye can see (Purnululu National Park).
In 21 days we travelled from Broome, along the Great Northern Highway to Kununurra and back to Broome along the, recently opened and ever so slightly muddy, Gibb River Road. We learned the art of mudcrabbing from an Aboriginal guide in Lombadina and feasted on our freshly cooked haul in the local community. We photographed sunrises and sunsets, virtually alone, on the remote beaches of Cape Leveque and lay on the beach at night admiring the full moon and shooting stars. We took pictures of boab sunrises, boab sunsets, boab reflections and pretty much every boab shape we could find. We wandered through the ancient Devonian reef formations of Windjana Gorge, Tunnel Creek and Geikie Gorge. We took striking pictures of bushfire smoke creeping across an eerie burnt out landscape. We followed local guides, and our own intrepid leader, to find rarely seen rock art and relics of ancient cultures. We snapped hundreds of shots of Purnululu at sunrise on a specially chartered helicopter flight. We dangled our legs over the side of the plummeting gorges at Mitchell Falls. We chased rain clouds around the countryside for some dramatic weather shots and we spent a significant amount of time swimming around in warm pools and showering in waterfalls in strikingly beautiful gorges.
And then there was the slightly hairy journey all the way up to Kalumburu on a road that nearly devoured our car in its huge holes, was allegedly closed and was also described as like ‘driving through custard’. Nevertheless it was one of the most fascinating, memorable and inspiring days of our trip where we saw beautiful gorges and beaches and were privileged to meet many of the community’s most colourful characters. One of whom, Father Anscar, deserves a special mention for the entertaining tour of his own treasure trove of a museum containing hundreds of artifacts from the local area and the rest of the world – including a shell model of the Last Supper that used to belong to
Yassar Arafat!
As if all that is not enough there is the list of animals we encountered and photographed along the way: goannas, snakes (including a scary Taipan), kangaroos (one of which attempted to get in my tent), wallabies, soldier crabs, lots of cows, frilled lizards, owls, dingos, spiders, crocodiles, bats, a dead wild boar, frogs (usually in the toilet), so many fantastic birds – kites, hawks, eagles, brolgas, bustards, the list goes on - and even a dog that was trying to play pool.
I should also perhaps add that we were provided with fantastic food, expert knowledge and very skilled driving by our resident driver/guide/photography tutor.
‘Adventure’ is certainly the word to sum up our Kimberley experience, perhaps occasionally mixed with ‘crazy’ and just excellent fun. As for the snakebite incident…I’ll leave that to Andrew to explain.
This article and images were contributed by Helen Osler (aka The Patron Saint of Owls) of Perth. We are most grateful for her work and pleasant company, but we won't mention the snakebite incident. Helen is booked on another tour soon, so you might meet her there.