Where do I start, the Bungle Bungles has been the best place we have explored so far-hands down and that’s a big call! National Parks do a good campsite. We got here last night after taking almost 2hours to travel 50km on the access road, mummy caught edge of whatever bug Cam had and was wondering seriously whether this trip was worth it.
However we awoke still on Territory time to the sun coming through our open windows (as nighttime is getting warm in the close confines!) and daddy was making some pancakes and all of a sudden our trip is back on track!
We chose the Southern campsite in the Purnululu National Park, closest to the iconic Beehive formations and Cathedral Gorge, so we set off to explore those. Cam’s leg still a bit dicey so we didn’t know how far he could walk, most of the trail was riverbeds so either sand or large river rocks to contend with but he was as keen as all of us to get exploring so was fine. I’m surprised how dry everything already is, especially after such a massive wet season, most of the creek crossings were bone dry as we drove in, spinifex still largely green which is a nice change to the Central Territory where it must only green up like this once every 10 years or so with big rains. Lots more trees but nothing very mature- thinking that’s closely related to the termite mounds we see everywhere but not sure, must ask someone about that. Kids started noticing an abundance of dead frogs, guessing again their life over now wet season is, really should read up on places before we arrive?!
Stu found a poor frog that hadn’t quite died yet which was on the receiving end of some handfuls of rocks before we could stop him. Any waterholes were small and slimy with frog spawn/algae, as we walked into chasms where the sun doesn’t spend much time it was very cool with even some palm trees. The Bungle Bungles are the result of the erosion of a huge mountain range to the NW, with rivers laying down layers and layers of sediment- we estimated each ‘level’ or line in the rocks took 1 million years to lay down, just incredible and very difficult to grasp the insane age of all the rocks around us. We walked through the Beehives and onto Cathedral Gorge, passing some more elderly tour groups having multiple hydration rest stops, man they must have to sign a lengthy waiver form or the tour companies have good insurance as I wasn’t sure some of them were going to make it back! Cathedral Gorge was beautiful, we had it almost to ourselves for a while. The tour groups did eventually make it and one of the guides played some music on his little speakers to show the acoustics, was a bit corny when he almost played Still Call Australia Home by accident, but he certainly added an appropriate level of mystique to the experience when he swapped that for didgeridoo music.
Back to campsite for lunch break and drive to the Northern side of the park for a different walk through Echidna Chasm. A solid 1km of riverbed trail led us into a really narrow chasm with some rocks hanging precariously overhead. We hadn’t started as enthusiastically as for the morning’s exploring but this was pretty incredible once we got there too.
Actually had a few daylight hours back at the campsite - an experience we are hoping to emulate daily now we are in the Kimberleys, for a bit of mucking about and first go at camp shower out of a solar bag. Was pretty novel for all of us, but not something we will be doing often, hopefully swimming in gorges will suffice for our daily toilette instead.