Alan & Lyn's Huge Adventure: 10/8/20 Derby

Hi there , we're back in service after 10 days out in the bush - but that's another set of blogs yet to come .

We've made our way to Derby for a few days or so to get some things before our next adventure . We are staying at Birdwood Downs Station , and it's a great place - no powered sites though , and there are cabins as well . It's getting a little old & rustic , but has great bathrooms & a laundry and the best water - it tastes great .

Heading in to town , we went out to the jetty as the tide was nearly fully in - only a few metres below the jetty . It's been quite some time since any trains have been on these tracks , and is now used by trucks to deliver to the jetty for loading onto boats .

This old crane would have been in use a long time ago as well , now sitting near the old train tracks and rusting away .

The views from above were good as well , gives you an idea of how it all sits in place . The water is brown due to the tide height changes - up to 9.5m , so that's a lot of water going in & out of the gulf .

This is looking back to town , surrounded by claypans either side .

This is looking up the gulf to the open ocean , these are tidal flats , but only have water in them during the wet season rains .

Back out to Birdwood Downs and we headed out into the farm to check out the huge Boabs . This one is almost as wide as our ute is long !!!

Here's another one that was only 400m away , small termite mounds here as well haha !

Back at the homestead area I spotted a strange bird , so followed it around to get a photo - it's a Pheasant !

We moved back into town for a few days to charge everything up and went for a drive out & around the wetland project on the edge of town and the clay pans . I think the locals use it as a highway - you can see the dark track where they've been driving stretching off into the distance .

The clay pan is quite firm and easy to drive on - only leaving some tyre tracks .

It also looks good from above .

All around the edge of the clay pan seemed to be a nursery area for Boab trees - there were quite a lot everywhere we seemed to go .

While getting things organised for our next adventure we took some time out and visited some of the more famous Derby icons - the Prison Boab tree . We'd seen bigger Boabs out at Birdwood Downs , so a photo wasn't required . There's also the longest cattle trough as well .