Purnululu NP to Kununurra, Western Australia
A quick goodbye to the Bungle Bungles: we head out a day early so we can replace our failing main battery in the LandCruiser, and discover that the power steering is going as well. We manage to sneak in a wonderful early morning helicopter ride over the Bungle Bungle range, though, and a short hike to Cathedral Gorge.
Morning comes early in Western Australia; I was up at 5:15am with the first light of dawn and the first cawing of the campsite crows. This far east in the time zone, the sun rises at 5:49am--and sets around 5:15pm. I much prefer Daylight Savings Time, I must say.
It was no problem at all getting out of camp by 7:20 and over to the helipad for our 8:15am flight we'd arranged yesterday. A short wait, a quick safety briefing, and we were away in a small Kawasaki DH4 helicopter--without doors! We flew north towards the Bungles, peering down into deep palm-lined canyons and steep red gorges, then finally came over the northeast side to Horseshoe Valley. I've wanted to see that, since you can't drive or hike there. It was great, and I finally think I've found a spot in Australia that rivals the best parts of the American Southwest--in particular, the red rock country of southern Utah and northern Arizona. They are that spectacular, especially from the air. We saw what the Bungles look like under their black and orange skin--they're white sandstone! The pilot pointed out a spot where lightning had hit a cliff wall, causing the outer surface to fall away into the gorge below.
After Horseshoe Valley, our helicopter trip headed along the southeastern face of the Bungles massif. That's where the famous orange and black striped 'beehives' are. The Bungle ranges are old sandstone and conglomerate; and with the prevailing winds coming from the southeast the sandstone's been eroded into lumpy shapes that best resemble huge beehives. The striping is caused by cyanobacteria, which feed off of the water and rock to form a protective greenish-black coating. In many layers of the sandstone, where there's a lower clay content, there isn't enough water for the cyanobacteria to grow, so those layers appear orange.
Anyway, I took a lot of pictures on our thirty minute flight--ninety snapshots in all! By the time we'd gotten back to the helipad, I was very pleased we'd done it. Sure, it was very expensive at $360 for both of us, but it's one of those really expensive and worth it things.
More Expense
Well, that's not the only expense that we're going to incur in the next few days. Last night driving into the campsite, Chris and I both noticed an odd hum coming from the front of the car whenever the steering wheel was turned Uh oh. Well, today it's back, and it's worse, with the steering getting harder and stuff dripping under the car. At the helipad parking lot, we peered under the front of the car and found a mess of steering fluid. Blech. This puts a bit more imperative in getting to the nearest town, Kununurra, before the shops close this afternoon. And it's a Friday, meaning we might be spending a bit more time in Kununurra than we thought. Hopefully the power steering will last. It's about two hours drive out of the park on a fairly rough 4WD track (50 kilometers in two hours--it's slow! That's about 15 miles per hour for the metrically impaired). Then it's another 2 1/2 hours into Kununurra, with only the Turkey Creek Roadhouse for supplies.
So we took it a bit easy with the battery and the power steering problem. Fortunately, Turkey Creek Roadhouse had some power steering fluid (which in our case is the same as automatic transmission fluid), so we were able to top up before heading up the road--and I bought a 4 liter jug of fluid just in case. Once in Kununurra, we drove around to a good six or seven auto repair shops. Nothing had anyone who could look at it until Monday (the Toyota dealer couldn't look at it until the 19th!), so we faced the fact that we'll be spending the next three days in Kununurra. We did replace the wonky battery though, with a more reputable heavy duty brand... with an 18 month warranty even!
At least there's a bit to do here in Kununurra. We can go hiking in the small national park that's right next to town, and see things around town proper... maybe even take a day trip to Wyndham, a port town on the sea about an hour's drive away. As long as we top up the power steering fluid, I suspect we'll be OK.
So we pulled into Hidden Valley Caravan Park, got a tent site for three nights, and ate dinner. The setting is nice, just behind our tent site all of 100 meters away is a little mini Bungle Bungles of striped sandstone. We'll go walking there tomorrow. And there's a Saturday market in town that sounds fun.
I must say, though, that I'm a bit worried that we'll be rushing through the Kimberley so that we can get to our rendezvous at Billabong Roadhouse on the 31st. The north part of western Australia is divided into three areas--from north to south, they are the Kimberley, then the Pilbara and then the Gascoyne. The Billabong Roadhouse is at the very southern edge of the Gascoyne. From here, on the sealed roads, it's a good two days drive on the sealed road to Port Hedland, then another two days drive to Billabong. If we leave here on the 12th of August, that's all of 19 days. I guess it'll be enough time, but it still feels like a bit of pushing it.
So, I guess I'll force myself to relax here in Kununurra... more relaxation than I'd like... but it'll be OK. Good thing we've stocked up on books in Darwin!
Weird Wildlife Sighting
Nothing much. Really. Except for that blue winged bird that we hit at 110 km/h. Dunno what it was, but it flew right into the bullbar.
Oh, we did see a short eared wallaby grazing on the grass in the campground.