Charnley River Station:  21 – 23 August.

The 90km drive from MWC back to the Gibb River road was quite relaxed.  We were in no hurry as the next place to visit was Charnley River station, which is only 40km off the Gibb road and 4km to the turn off from the MWC turn off.  In reality it’s best to drive these roads slowly as there are no road signs with any warnings at all.  Thus you could go around a bend and drive straight into a deep creek river crossing with no warning whatsoever.  On the track to Charnley River station, we drove around one bend and suddenly there was a locked gate.  I didn’t have to brake hard, but interestingly the dust cloud behind the car ignored the brakes and overtook us.  Thus for a minute or so we saw nothing, not even the gate.  During the drive we came across one of these mini tornados.  Suddenly we noticed coming from the left this tornado spiral.  It was only 2-3 meters wide and heading for the road in front of us.  So I slowed down, while Sibba yelled “Don’t drive into it!”  As it crossed the road it seemed to dissipate as quickly as it formed.  Pretty weird stuff I must say.

We arrived at the station and were assigned our camping spot.  The main things to see here are a couple of gorges, Dillies Gorge and Greville Gorge, plus some pools and other wildlife.  We quickly set up camp and then sat down for a cup of tea to discuss our activities later in the day and the following day.  We then realised there were a number of birds zooming around us, so we got our binoculars to check them out.  We noticed a small flock of female Superb Fairy Wrens.  They were foraging just a couple of meters away and quite happily ignored us.  Also, a flock of Grey Crowned Babblers joined the fray.  These birds just can’t shut up at all!  After a while, I took a walk to the amenities and on the way back I saw a couple of Kangaroos in the middle of the campground.  As soon as they noticed me, they scampered away.  They seemed to like the campground, but were shy of any campers.  We saw a lot of them around the after that.   However, then I noticed a flock of small birds foraging in the sandy open area of the ground.  After viewing them with my binoculars and getting Sibba to view them as well, we confirmed that these were Crimson finches.  A small but very beautiful crimson coloured bird.  There were 9 of them foraging and they stayed for quite a while.  I took some photos, but they don’t do them any justice as I was up against the sun.  I did walk around and got to the other side of the flock, only a couple of meters away.  There I turned on the camera, focused and then nothing??  The battery had gone flat, right at the most critical moment.  I sneaked back to the car, got another battery installed, but by the time this was all finished, the finches had flown.  Ah well, perhaps next time!

We then headed out to one of the pools, so Kylie and I could go for a swim.  This was only a short drive and walk from the campsite.  It’s called Donkey hole.  There are three pools, the last one was still pretty good to swim in.  Kylie was keen to experience the swimming, so I took her out into the pool in one of Sibbas biggest zipper bag.  She had a great time, as did I.  We then drove to the Mt Glemont lookout.  This provided a surround view over the landscape, plus a fantastic view of the sunset.    We then drove back to camp and had our dinner.

Me and Kylie swimming in Donkey Hole number three!

Donkey Hole three overview, can you spot Sibba?

There she is, sitting on the rocks.

Donkey hole two, overview.

The following morning we headed out to explore the Grevillea Gorge, Lillys Pool and the Dillies Gorge.  Grevillia Gorge is a 30km drive one way from the Campsite.  So is Dillies Gorge, but they do share the first 15km, so it’s not all that bad.  Lillys pool is just a couple of kilometres from Grevillea Gorge.  In fact it’s part of the same river and is only a kilometre up-stream from Grevillea Gorge.  So all in all we probably drove around 90km today on the same property.  As I proceeded to reverse away to commence our trip, I reversed into a tree!  Of course the tree stood its ground, but the spare wheel pushed into the left barn door, where the handle is that is used to open up the barn doors.  As we didn’t want to spend any time analysing the damage we simply went on our trip.  Later in the day, once we realised that in order to get our lunch, we had to open up the rear barn doors, I tried to open it and it wouldn’t budge.  I then got a screw driver and after some analysis, used it to pull the handle a bit out.  Once done, the locking mechanism worked fine.  Thus we got our lunch!  The following day I took it apart and glued it together and in the end got it working again.  Just another mark on the car to remember our journey by!

Grevillea Gorge.

On the way there are the compulsory creek crossings, but we also had to get through a herd of cattle.  They were so lazy, Sibba had to get out of the car to drive them off the road.  They didn’t want to give way for the car.  This was in addition to the kangaroos that played daredevils and jumped in front of the car on occasions.  Neither the cattle or kangaroos were successful in their suicidal attempts, so we arrived at Grevillea Gorge unscathed!  It’s a very short walk down to the gorge, but the last bit requires one to climb down a ladder.  Then, you are standing in the middle of the river bed.  We began by walking up-stream first as it looked more scenic.  Then down-stream.  This gorge is rather narrow and is cut deep into the landscape in series of deep pools, each following the other further down.  I had planned to do some swimming, but the last and lowest pool required further climbing down, so I decided not to.  It was not worth the risk of breaking something, especially my legs.  We then climbed back up the ladder and out of the gorge. 

Grevillea Gorge, looking up-stream.

Grevillea Groge, down-stream.

Me at the bottom of the pool in Grevillea Gorge.  It was empty!

Further down Grevillea gorge, there was a swimming pool.  Requires some climbing down!

The step ladder to get into and out of Grevillea gorge.  Sibba about to journey up again!

Lillys Pool.

This was a short drive back up-stream and then a short walk to the river.  Once there we saw that there was still water in the pool, but it still required some gymnastics to climb down to it.  It’s not advised to jump into any of these pools, as there can be hidden rocks or ledges that greet your head, once it breaks the surface.  Not a pleasant headache that!  We walked back and headed out to Dillies gorge in the hope that the swimming would be better there.

Lillys Pool.

Dillies Gorge.

This gorge is completely different from the other one.  A lot wider and heaps of water in the pools.  This is where I  went for a swim.  I swam around 200m down-stream  in the pool and back, while Sibba found a hole full of shadow and planted herself there.  This pool was much longer and there was also a lot of fish there.  We should have brought a net, so we could catch and grill the fish on the stones as it was around 35 degrees hot.  This gorge also had a lot of Boab Trees littering the banks.  Another amazing place in the Kimberley. 

Sibba walking in Dillies Gorge.

Sibba in her pool of shadow!

Me swimming in Dillies Gorge.

We had our lunch and then drove back to camp.  As we pulled up beside our tent, Sibba noticed the Crimson Finches next to it!  They were waiting for us, obviously knowing about my problems with the camera battery the previous day.  So, I gave Sibba the camera to take a photo of one of them, before we scared them away as we exited the car.  You can even see the spotted dots under their wings in the photo.  

Crimson Finch in the campsite!