This morning we packed up and parked Bridget up in the day area, and jumped on board the Discovery Clipper, and headed to Bell Gorge with Brenda and David. Packing up Bridget for a dirt road involves closing all windows, putting the dowel rods in to try and keep the self-opening windows shut, putting on the kings size fitted sheet over all the bedding, making sure all drawers and cupboards are firmly shut. Ian and Meredith had to take Trailways into Derby to repair their leaking fuel tank. Elise and Simon came along the walk with us and the 6 of us did the walk to the top of the waterfall at Bell Gorge. It was another beautiful waterfall, that had a series of ledges that the water flowed down into a large rock pool. There was an extra walk over the creek and up over the rocks and a clamber down the steep and slippery rocks to the rock pool, which we all managed. Brenda and Simon braved the water, though Simon opted for a quick swim, but Brenda the water baby, enjoyed exploring all the rock pools and swam around to the next pool to see where it went. We just sat basking in the warm sun on the rocks. We could see the other sightseers above at the top of the waterfall. Others also got brave and did the climb down to where we were and jumped into the green waters.
Eventually, Brenda hopped out and enjoyed the sunshine with us and we soon headed back up over the rocky cliff and over the creek crossing and returned back to the Discovery Clipper. David drove us back to Bridget and then we headed back down the terrible road, which had fortunately just been graded and was a much better drive back out to the Gibb River Road. The Gibb was still having sections where it was very corrugated and rough. We went through a few spectacular ranges, before stopping for lunch at Marchfly Glen. Fortunately, the location didn’t live up to its name. We continued down the Gibb, while David, Brenda, Elise and Simon headed off to Mt Hart Homestead for the night, and we kept going down the Gibb, until we reached the Windjana Gorge turn off. This road was equally as terrible as the road out to Bell Gorge had been, only difference was that it was wider and we had more options to drive around the torn up patches. I put my headphones in to use as ear protection from the noise. Everything that could, rattled and vibrated in Bridget. Finally, we made it to the campground and drove around until we found a spot. Then it was time to do the post dirt road procedure. This involves removing the fitted sheet from the bedding and shaking out the dirt, removing the dowel rods and opening the windows to let in some cool air, dusting all the window frames, sweeping the floors, wiping down the kitchen benches, shower floor, tops of bed storage units and sometimes mopping the floor too. Most of our clothes, towels and sheets have an orange tinge and today Matt’s right side of his beard was distinctly orange.
After a break, Matt went to check out all the rattles and squeaks in the suspension, while I went and checked out the options for the walks of Windjana Gorge which we will do tomorrow. We then headed out for a stroll to see the sunset at the rocks. After only saying this morning that we hadn’t seen any kangaroos on the Gibb, we saw 6 today, including one we could hear in the bush in our sunset stroll. Just being Matt and I here, we took the chance to call Callum and see how he is going. So a quiet evening to reflect on our day and wrote up the blog for you all to keep up.
