I am typing this blog sitting in the camper after our first night in Windjana Gorge National Park.
We have decided to stay here for a couple of nights and drove out The Gibb River Road from Derby this morning. Most of the road today was tar but on the first couple of kilometers of the dirt section we came across four bicycle riders coming the other way. One was from America, one from Germany and two from England. They had started riding from Darwin and are riding around Aus. for the next eight months. Talk about mad dogs and Englishmen, even most Aussies wouldn't take on a ride like that!
We also stopped to look at the prison Boab Tree and Myall's Bore and a 120 metre long cattle trough,built in 1911 and is thought to be the longest in the Southern Hemisphere. It was thought to have been originally filled from the bore.After this first stop we also stopped at the Mowanjum Art centre where we watched a video, about the community and their artwork, which was very interesting.
We arrived here early this afternoon and after setting up enjoyed a relaxing afternoon and a leisurely walk around the two campsites, one for those campers using generators and the one where we have camped which is a "quiet camp". Shame about the two noisy families camped next to us! One of the dads was giving the boys a logarithm lesson after dinner - not sure if the boys didn't know more about what he was trying to tell them than he did but to us it was all double dutch. This morning we are going to do a walk through the Gorge and then in the afternoon we will drive to Tunnel Creek and do a walk there.
Well we did our walk through Windjana Gorge and it was terrific. We passed about 30 freshwater crocs on the way and there were some decent size barramundi and other small fish in the water. It was a very pleasant 2 hour walk with spectacular scenery. After lunch we set off for Tunnel Creek which was about 30 klms from camp. It is a cave situation that you walk through water and require a torch to see where you are going. We got part of the way through but claustrophobia and a dodgy torch got the better of me so we turned back. Once back at the camp we were overrun by a group of about 20 kids running wild through the camp while the parents enjoyed themselves, also a group of backpackers competed with the kids in the noise competition and when everyone quietened down at about 10 o'clock a camper arrived and they talked for about an hour. Another quiet night!

We moved onto Silent Grove the next morning and set up camp early, then walked to Bell Gorge. It has a couple of swimming holes and a spectacular waterfall.
Yesterday we were off again and had planned to stay at Manning Gorge but heard reports from different sources that there were up to 300 people camping there each night and only 3 showers (one of which was out of order). We re-thought our plans and visited Galvan Gorge, which was very lovely and and an enjoyable walk down to a cool waterhole, fed by a picturesque waterfall.
We continued on our journey along the Gibb River Road, which was corrugated and stoney in parts but so far was not could as bad as we thought it could have been. The worst thing is the continual dust but even this becomes a part of the experience.
We stopped for lunch at Mt Barnett Roadhouse then it was onto Ellenbrae Station for the night. Camping here was pretty basic but quiet.