Derby

Our last night at Derby, finished off with a fine home-cooked meal and some nice wine, good company, and sharing stories from our shared times together over nearly fifty years.

But first, back to Fitzroy Crossing where we still had a day to finish off before heading further West to the coastal town of Derby. First thing for the day was to go to Warren’s church. This was not that difficult, as we were camped barely 20 meters from the back door. The service itself was a standard AOG service consisting of a fairly lengthy bracket of songs – mostly new for us – and a sermon. Apart from ourselves, the congregation was entirely Aboriginal, and Warren has given the music a very Country and Western flavour which is the preferred style for the locals. They all made us feel very welcome. Warren and Sheena do an amazing job among the Aboriginal community with the barest of resources. After lunch, Warren and his wife Sheena, headed off for the 260 kilometre trip to Derby where they take an evening service, while we piled into our vehicles for a shorter trip to Danngu Gorge for another short boat trip to admire yet more beautiful geological formations and see the wildlife.

Danngu is quite a bit different to the other gorges we have seen, but as we have still just skimmed the surface of the vast region, there is so much to observe and learn. But Danngu is carved into limestone and the actions of water, wind and debris has shaped the cliffs into wondrous forms and caves and crevices. The crocodiles were out in the hundreds, sunning themselves on the sandy banks and rock ledges, and we encountered a few swimming in the water as well. We are yet to see a large croc, but I am sure will encounter one along the way – hopefully at a safe distance. We arrived home to begin our preparations for our travel to Derby on Monday.

I have taken to writing a little each day, so this may begin to read a bit like a diary. But as a 70 something year old, I am finding that by the end of the week my memory is struggling. Luckily Jen keeps some pretty good notes.

So, we are now in Derby which is the largest town we have visited in Western Australia so far. Compared to Fitzroy Crossing it is a vibrant cosmopolitan city: It has a café as well as a restaurant. Derby has a very fine gallery with a lot of Indigenous art. We have been on he lookout for some artwork for our house. Our criteria is that is has to “jump out” to both of us. Unfortunately, we have completely different tastes, so the chance of getting some sort of consensus is a bit remote. I found the perfect piece, at which Jen just snorted, while Jen’s, for her, an absolutely stunning painting looked, to me, like a useful tea towel. Maybe we have to get two pieces. There was a gallery and museum a few kilometres out of town, established by a local Indigenous community. The Mowanjum Art and Culture Centre is a very fine establishment. The contributing artists focus almost entirely on the Wandjina Spirit – the creator spirit that unites all the various language groups of this part of the Kimberley. Readers might recall the iconic Wandjina sculpture that was part of the Sydney 2000 Olympic opening ceremony. Anyway, we still could not find our own unifying art piece.

Derby also afforded us the opportunity to visit the Horizontal Waterfalls. John, Pauline, Jenny and I had an early start to be taken to Derby Airport for the short flight out to the Falls. I was astounded to see not one, but five seaplanes queued up outside the hangar to escort about 60 people to enjoy this amazing natural phenomenon. The Cessna 208 is a sturdy little plane, but clearly designed for the very short and thin. They must have been short of pilots, and John was given the job of co-pilot. After shoehorning us in, the pilot squeezed in beside John and successfully took us over the flatlands of the mouth of the Fitzroy River where it splits and divides through wide mud flats. I am guessing it is a delta, but my last geography lesson was nearly 60 years ago.

It was just a half hour flight before the plane dipped over a steep ridge and dropped into the calm waters of Talbot Bay. Landing on water seems to avoid the bumpiness of landing on land. The excursion included feeding a pack of hungry looking sharks, and some boat tours upriver and then through the rapid tidal flow slicing through a couple of narrow gorges. The force of water as it drops about a metres, is massive and the boat bucks wildly as it fights the swirling torrents of the flow. Boating through the gap is not possible at higher tides which can be up to 11 metres. That would be quite frightening, and indeed, dangerous, which I suppose is one of the good reasons it is not done.

We had a pleasant lunch of grilled barramundi and salads and then squeezed in to the planes for the return flight which took us out over the wider waters of King Sound.

Anne and Rob had a quiet day at home, though Anne raided the local Woolworths for some chicken and cooked up a delectable chicken and mushroom crepe dinner, which we washed down with a nice Margaret River Red. It was indeed very pleasant to wind down and reminisce and laugh about old times – the good ole days.

Even though the day had been quite passive, with the main physical exercise being contorting ourselves to re-form our lumpy shapes into the plane, the fresh sea air and the rush of excitement as we sped through the waterfalls, and the spray and wind in our faces, made us all feel just a little exhausted, so we were glad to fall into bed.

Oh, I forgot to mention that my own excitement included a swim with the sharks. When I say “with”, I mean in an adjacent tank – the sharks are in the open water, but arrive to get a bit of a feed of barramundi. I had visions of fighting them off with a few stern words and a steely glare but I had to be content with peering dimly through a steel cage. The water was bit murky as I shared it with a few thousand bait fish who shuffled up to all the best positions to tease the sharks behind the protective mesh. The best sights were from the edge of the tank. However, it was nice to get in the water with the bait fish and have a splash around.

Tomorrow we head for Broome, about 200 kilometres south of Derby. We have a bit of free time at Broome, tough we are heading out to Cape Leveque for a couple of nights “glamping”, and a couple of days to explore this remote and beautiful part of The Kimberleys. I will have more to write about next week!