Day 79 – Tunnel Creek and Windjana Gorge

One of the problems of arriving at a campsite in darkness is you don’t get to see what it looks like. Sometimes this is a problem, like when you park next to decayed remains of animals, other times it’s a shame because you don’t get a sense of the beauty of the area. Last night was one of those other times. I could see that we were parked next to a boab tree (the name of the campground, RAAF Boab Quarry, kind of made me expect to see some) and could see the silhouette of rocks (again, quarry, expected rocks). It was a pleasant surprise when the sun came up (which is still too early) and we could get a full sense of the area – very pretty.

A little north of where we spent the night (on the unsealed tourist road between Fitzroy Crossing and the Gibb River Road) are two of the Devonian reef national parks – Tunnel Creek, and Windjana Gorge.

Funny enough, the first that I’d heard of Tunnel Creek was in a children’s book, Are We There Yet, given to us by a friend before we left. It looked/sounded interesting, so it was added to the itinerary, and here we are today. Risa has had enough of the dust/unsealed roads and is feeling a little over gorges, so it was a tough sell to come here, especially since I didn’t share what it made it so special with her (very, very sneaky). So when she found out that it’s basically a cave with a small creek flowing through it, she was happy.

It was really unusual (in my mind) that we were given free reign to explore the tunnel/cave – no guides, no barriers, just the suggestion to wear study shoes and to bring a torch!

Actually, the first challenge for us was finding the entrance to the cave (no trail markers). We had to explore around some rather large rocks to find the cave entrance.

The tunnel is about 800m long, with an opening about half way along. There was (icy cold) water in most of the tunnel, but we only had to wade across it a few times, the rest of the time we were walking on sand/rocks.

The reflections off the still water were beautiful – Risa was incredibly patient waiting for me to take photos (and being my lighting assistant when required).

Risa actually found (I’m sure she wasn’t the first to find it, but there were no signs to help her) the source of the water in the creek. The biggest surprise was the warmth of that water! It was warmer than Mataranka/Katherine. There was a bit of a pool above where the source was flowing from which I’m sure would have made an awesome bath. I’m sure the outlaw Jandamarra (who was hiding here for three years after killing a policeman and some others back in the 19^th century) would have made good use of it!

At the end of the tunnel there was some more rock art, and other little things that took our interest.

Further north was Windjana Gorge National Park – also a part of the same Devonian-era (360,000,000 BC) reef system. We were a bit surprised about the $11 day use fee for this park – we’re noticing it’s a bit of a trend in W.A. (Purnululu also charged this fee). We’ll have to try and get a four-week visitor pass to try and save some money.

The gorge is (unsurprisingly) the same rock as Tunnel Creek, but here the cliffs soar up to 100m above the ground. The gorge is only a few kilometres long, but it’s surprisingly wide, up to 150m in some places. It was nice, and worth a visit (even with the $11 entry fee), but it was rather hot and not really the best time of day for a long hike. We walked half of the gorge, then returned to the car. I think gorges have lost their lustre for a little while. Maybe after we get bored of WA’s beaches…

Also surprising was the abundance of fresh water crocodiles – you might not be able to see it in this photo, but I counted 32 crocodiles before taking the photo! And that’s just in this one little section!

Dinner: Risa wanted dahl and back when we were at Uluru (Yulara, to be precise) she bought a spice kit to make some. Changed her mind tonight, and just made it from scratch with lentils, beans, ginger, butter, garlic and spices (probably other things, too, but I’m no cook). I know the food photos don’t really do justice to it (I’m more interested in eating dinner, and keeping insects out), but it was delicious.