Up with the birds again , sun barely over the horizon over east , Hmm this may be going to be a trend this trip . Another beautiful morning and day , blue skies & sunshine , anyway here's the Barker River just below our campsite . Yes you can swim here as well , they also have a couple of peddle boats you can use.
Our campsite under some nice shady trees .
After breakfast , lunch packed , it was off into todays activities . Further down the track was a sign - secret fishing spot - it must of been secret , no one was there 😉
Today we were tackling our 2nd gorge - Dolorite Gorge . I do hope you're not going to get sick of gorges & water , there's more to come . Surrounded by hills covered in dark rocks , crystal clear rock pools & tall paperbarks , the gorge walk wasn't an easy walk , rather a rock hop - no real tracks , just make your way there & back as best you can .
Last wet season , they did get some normal rain , and with that the expected flooding that closes down the Kimberley . It ripped out paperbarks and left them lying there , flood debris was several metres above us as we were walking .
While wandering around the gorge I crossed the river and looked down to see a solitary white flower poking up from a sheltered spot behind a rock .
I decided to do a closeup shot of it - WOW -it had little tendrils with clear balls of something on the ends - obviously very sticky - I'd found a carnivorous insect eating/consuming plant that I'd never seen before . What a stunning plant in a really harsh environment .
And here's the gorge , it gives you an idea of the scale of it . If you look to the right of the tree you will see me there .
And this is the other end of the gorge from above .
This is the middle section of the gorge - lot of rock right there !
Here's some of that flood debris that's about 2m above the ground - and that's outside the gorge in the area where the ground levels out and the water has a chance to spread out .
From Dolorite Gorge we headed further up the access track to Annies Creek , where there was another short walk along the side of the creek and over it to a Boab tree that was being overtaken by a fig tree . Well the start of the walk had a start point , but the track was somewhat overgrown - this photo was taken at my normal standing height - the grass was still taller than me !!!
We made our way back to the ute and decided to drive around to near the Boab - just had to do a water crossing that was about 700mm deep and rocky - it's the first time we've needed 4wd so far .
Over the crossing and we walked around to the trees , discovering a pretty butterfly that cooperated with the photographer .
The Boab was okay , but we'd seen bigger in Derby , but here's the top of it , nuts & all .
Next was a 17klm drive to Yellowman Gorge . We drove as far as we could get - and this was it .
So we had lunch and took in the serenity of it before heading off down the gorge .
My lovely wife spotted this , also cooperative , butterfly - we've seen hundreds of butterflies here , but haven't managed to get photo's like these .
We walked down again doing a lot of rock hopping in between smoother sandy spots . This one not so much gorge , rather a river bed winding it's way through .
The drive back was through more high grassland .
Time for a beer and a relax , another day done , we decided to have some of the best fish & chips in the Kimberley , down at the homestead . You could have a choice of pizza (a few varieties ) or fish & chips .
It lived up to it's advertising , it was quite nice , we would recommend it - don't know anywhere else in this Kimberley area that does fish & chips either 😉 . After chatting with several people who seem to be on the same travel schedule as us , we headed back to camp . another day , another adventure . Here's a map link :- https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=128Uyxd-Tz6AnBjGZ9owy58dBEk0MYx6q&usp=sharing
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