*** WARNING - This blog contains references to bodily functions that may offend some readers ***
Well, this is the last day of our first week of travel - it's gone quickly. We spent the day touring the Bungle Bungles. This place has serious Wow factor!!! We set off at 0600 down the worst road I've ever driven on. It's pretty much the consensus of opinion around the place that the road is crap. We took 2 hours to do 50km. That just gets to visitor centre where you pay your money and get a permit for your car for the privilege of traversing the next 30 km of this 'beautiful' road. But getting to the other end certainly paid off. We chose to do the 3 km walk to the Cathedral Gorge. The Bungle Bungles is a sandstone formation located in the Purnululu National Park. The shapes carved by time in these rocks are unique and amazing. They are a dome like formation where the stratum (I think that's the plural of strata) of the sandstone are identical from one dome to another. I'm sure this tells of their history to those people with thick glasses that know all about this stuff.
Cathedral Gorge leads to a dead end of a huge natural amphitheatre. It is so massive, you just need to pause and take it all in. As it approached midday, the sun began to creep down the inside of the gorge walls which lights up the rich ochre tones of the sandstone. We spent an hour or so in there before heading back out because we had to be back at caravan park 80 km away by 1500 for our helicopter flight. Luckily, we allowed a little extra time - about 30km out from our destination, we destroyed a tyre. So careful not to end up with a second one, I took it a bit slower and the corrugations!!! Oh did I tell you the road was rough. Holy crap, I swear our new car is not that anymore. We made it back in one piece in time for our flight.
Well what an experience!!! The chopper took us over the entire formation which gives you the full picture of the vastness of the phenomenon. The chopper is a small one with no doors. I sat in the front and Judy and Les in the back. I wished the pilot had warned us when he was going to bank. After we landed, Les' description of how he held on at that point just cracked us up - I haven't laughed so hard for a long time. He reckoned that his arse puckered so much that the seat would have to be pulled back out. He had his legs tucked under the pilot's seat in front and hanging on to anything he could find. He reckoned if he was going to fall out, Jude and I would be stuffed because he had such a hold of the bar behind the pilot's seat, that he'd take the pilot with him - he wasn't goin alone.
What a day!!!
Links:
Google Maps reference is -17 26.49, 127 59.8833
See more images at... https://picasaweb.google.com/106361511620108780730/Day0713072012
A day of driving today. We made an early start - up at 0400 (NT time - 0430 EST, 0300 WA time). Got away from our campsite at 0545. We headed for Kununurra and picked up some replacement fruit and veg that we had stolen from us at the border quarantine. After a fuel stop and blog stop - that's where we stop on the side of the road and update the blog while we have Next-G reception. Les managed to find replacement latches for his tail gate so he fitted them there while I was blogging and we all had smoko. The tailgate became a must do after our trip back out from our previous campsite yielded a copious amount of dust ingress all over the storage of Les' and Barb's trailer. At the supermarket getting grocery supplies, we ran into 'Roothy' where Les bailed him up for a chat. Les was like he had met Santa for the first time - just tickled pink. For those of you who don't know, Roothy is a legend in the 4WD and Caravaning world. He has regular articles in several magazines such as '4WD Action' and 'Caravan & Motorhome' and has many DVD's of his adventures around this great land. Some of which Les has in the back of his car traveling with him. Anyway, he's a nice unassuming bloke and only too willing to oblige for a chat while he packed his groceries in the back of 'Milo', his truck. What a rocket!!! He was obliging to a couple of kids (and us) to have a photo taken with him.We set off from Kununurra for the Bungle Bungles. The drive had some breath taking scenery lining each side of the road. Huge mountain ranges with a unique appearance - some with large escarpments and some that look like a pile of boulders that have been stacked by some large bugger. There have been some recent fires through some of this country and it's interesting to note that the Boabs - and there are trillions of these things out here, seem to be resilient to bush fires. They appear virtually untouched where the fire has been all around them.We intended on going into the camp grounds at the Bungle Bungles but when we got to the front gate just off the road, we found they were full and requiring 48 hr prior bookings. That not being the way we roll, we pulled up stumps in a non-powered (and no amenities) area in the back of a caravan park nearer to the highway. Tomorrow, we will take a a drive down to the Bungle Bungles - we're told it's a pretty ordinary road so we'll get as much time in as we can by leaving at 0600. Les and Judy and I are booked on a chopper flight in the afternoon. I'm told it's the best way to take in this marvelous place. $250 for a 30 min flight I thought was reasonable and a must do having driven 3000 km to see the place - too hard to pass up. So I'll report back on how it all goes tomorrow.
Links:Google Maps reference is -17 26.49, 127 59.8833See more images at... https://picasaweb.google.com/106361511620108780730/Day0612072012
