We took the short drive, crossing into Western Australia for
the first time this trip.
Yeeeeehaaw!!! We had always liked
Kununurra, mainly for its location, and what it represented given the good
times we had here last time.
Our first job was to get our dead battery replaced. Luckily we found a place that stocked the
battery we wanted, and picked it up for Glenn to replace it once in camp. The prices for caravan parks have
sky-rocketed here (as per the rest of Australia), so we found the cheaper of
them, and setup. Glenn replaced the
battery, and we headed into town to start our list of jobs and
re-stocking. Of all our stock-up’s, this
was going to be one of the biggest, because we were about to head off into the
Kimberley and Gibb River Road, which meant we were likely to be away from any
shops for 4 – 6 weeks. That’s a LOT of
food!!
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| A great place for a coffee in town |
We did a few little jobs, and then decided to have fish and
chips for dinner. Bit of a trip
treat. We had heard of the ‘Barra Shak’,
and what a good job they did. We
declared this one of the best Fish and Chip meals we had EVER had. It cost us a fortune mind you, but in the
end, worth every penny. We also managed
to order a HUGE amount, quite ridiculous, but to our amazement, we ate every
last morsel.
The next day what a huge one. We managed to do a world record shop at
Coles, got more meat at the butcher, got a heap of beer (we weren’t going to
run out whilst on the Gibb like we did last time), and each of us also managed
to organise a birthday present for the other, given the upcoming September
birthday month. Glenn’s 40th
is on the 16th, so Amy was very excited to have found a present
whilst on the road. Wonder what it
is?????????????
In getting back to the caravan park, Glenn looked at the
pile of shopping he had to fit into the car, and declared that it was possible
we’d gone toooooooooooooooo far. Surely
it was not possible. “Tetris Man” did
his amazing work though, and squeezed everything in, although admittedly there
was some inventive storage.
We then headed off to Lake Argyle the next morning, wanting
to explore this amazing place a little more.
We passed Matt and Debbie on the road, having a quick conversation on
the UHF, and again talked about catching up in Kununurra.
Lake Argyle was created when they built a dam wall in the
late 60’s, a brainchild of Kimberley Durack, a founder of the region. The dam wall was built over 3 wet seasons,
and although they anticipated it would take 5 wet seasons to fill, it only took
two. Lake Argyle is HUUUUGE. It is declared as Open Water by the maritime
authorities given its size.
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| Lake Argyle |
We revisited our previous launch spot at the base of the dam
wall, when we took a 3 day canoe trip down the Ord River with friends Pete and
Ruth. We were treated to a free boat
ride by a tour operator who was waiting for his next set of passengers. We idled around the river for about half an
hour looking for crocs and checking out the scenery. The guy was extremely nice, and worth having
a chat to. Very lucky.
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| At the start of the Ord River |
From there, we set up in the local caravan park. We had thoughts of doing a sunset cruise on
the lake, just to complete our exploration.
It was a little expensive, and a little long, but after some serious
debate, we threw caution to the wind, and booked in.
The girls were very excited to do the short 4 minute bus
trip down to the boat, and then to hop aboard the tour boat. We were directed down the back just in case
the kids got restless, (unbeknown to us, our first sign of trouble). The operator got us all onboard, and then
started his safety drill. The second
sign of trouble was when another kid spoke during the drill. The guy immediately stopped, and quite rudely
laid down the law to the kids. “Children,
when I am speaking, you don’t speak, Ok kids?
Great” – Big smile. Hmmmmmmm
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| A fantastic view from the swimming pool |
From there, we were shown around the lake, and given some
quite impressive statistics and information about how big it is. It was definitely interesting, albeit
long. After about an hour or so, the guy
pulled up on the bank, and got out his chart and pointer. The lecture then started in earnest. This was ridiculous, and all of us with children
were all petrified about them making a noise.
It was his time, and he was going to shine in it!!!! No pesky kid would interrupt him!!! When he finally shut up, we headed off to the
middle of the lake to watch the sunset.
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| A swim at sunset |
The kids definitely wanted a swim, so Glenn hopped in with
the two girls, and floated around with our supplied noodles. It was lovely watching the sunset, but given
the depth of the water (in spots 40 metres deep), Glenn was a little paranoid
about the kids, even though they had their floaties on. We got out, had some nibbles, and settled
back for the trip back. All in all, it
was a nice enough trip, but for us, we felt totally and utterly unwelcomed with
kids. The operated needed a huge lesson
in being polite and managing kids, otherwise don’t encourage families to join
the boat ride!!
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