Our next stop was Balanggarra Home Valley, the only station along the Gibb currently being managed by an Aboriginal company, the Balanggarra Traditional owners.
Home Valley had a more relaxed vibe than El Questro - it was much smaller, so way less people around, and just more chill in general. Given the delays we'd already experienced due to injury and car troubles, we weren't sure we had enough time to make it up to Ngauwudu (the Mitchell Plateau) at all, and we had already accepted that we sadly wouldn't be able to make the side trip to Kalumburu that I had planned. But as we read more about Punamii Uunpuu (Mitchell Falls) we were inspired to at least give it a try, so we decided to shorten our stay at Home Valley and strike out for Drysdale River Station to get a sense of current state of road up to the plateau to see if we were up for giving it a go.
We were able to squeeze in a short tour of the station the morning of our departure with one of the local young men working there, Chishawn. Chrishawn shared a lot of stories both about the European settler / invader history of the station and the history and culture of the traditional owners. He showed us an old bull catcher truck his grandfather used while working on the station to catch feral bulls, which was super cool. He also showed us the older ringers sleeping quarters that had been built in the mid 1800s and used for almost a century. He then told us about some of the history of the Cockbourn Ranges, an amazing escarpment that dominates the landscape of the eastern Kimberly, that have been an vital part of the Balanggarra culture for tens of thousands of years. Recent research has found art and burial sites on the tops of the escarpments proving ongoing connection between the Balanggarra and country stretching over tens of thousands of years.
We also chatted with Chrishawn about his work with the Balanggarra rangers in the Indigenous Protected Area around Home Valley station who are working to maintain and protect the biodiversity and cultural heritage.
Finally, we had heard a bit more about the boab trees on the station, including one huge tree that people have suggested was hit by lighting many years ago so is now half a hollow tree, as well as another one that had a tap embedded into it sometime in the last century to be used as a water source. Unfortunately, he advised us that we were pretty much at the end of season for collecting and eating the boab nuts, which Nora and Josie were devastated to hear as they had been told the insides tasted like fairy floss. I'm not 100% sure that wasn't somewhat of an exaggeration 😝.
We girded our loins to head out onto what we had heard was going to be a rough stretch of road, and the corrugations were indeed A LOT. I was super keen to make it into Ellenbrae Station to experience their famous scones, which were delightful, but given our delayed start it was a pretty rushed affair. We then made it to the Gibb River free camp just after dark, but we were very lucky to have some lovely fellow campers help us find a spot to set up and boil some packet pasta for dinner. Big shout outs to Luke for moving his 4WD with a roof tent to give us an easy spot to pull into, and to Mark and Trudy for helping us back in no dramas.
In the morning we headed to Drysdale River Station to fill up on diesel and get as sense of the road condition up to Ngauwudu (the Mitchell Plateau). We also caught up with Mark and Trudy again, and got a bit of mechanical assistance from Mark, an electrical engineer, to help fix our car-caravan connector. There really is a very lovely community to be found among our fellow travellers!
Upon hearing the road north wasn't TOO terrible, we decided to head up to Munurru (King Edward) campsite, which was half way up to the falls. Jimmy, the Victorian who has the temporary ranger at Munurru told me that the national park that incorporates Ngauwudu and Punamii Uunpuu is the only national park in Australia that is managed by an Aboriginal corporation, the Wunambal Gaambera Aboriginal Corporation.
We set up camp and made some dinner, after checking out the river that the campsite is on the banks of the Munurru.
We hit the road early (for us!) and headed up what is generally considered one of the worst roads to traverse in the Kimberly. And it definitely lived up to its reputation! Bob got his eye in / built up his confidence behind the wheel so we made it up in good time. But it was still a 2 hours drive, and the sunset was going to be just after 5 pm, and it was 10 am by the time we arrived. Given the round trip to and back from the falls was at least 5 hours, it was getting tight, and there was a very tempting option of getting a helicopter ride back from the falls to the carpark. It was a splurge, but the day before we had actually priced the hours long helicopter flight all the way up to the Falls from Drysdale, to avoid having the attempt the drive, so in comparison the 6 minute flight back to the carpark was a bargain. So we booked in for a 2:30 flight back and headed out on the walk!
Our first stop along the way was Bunjani, or Merten Falls.
On the walk down to the pool we were able to view some of the amazing rock art, including some featuring Gwion Gwion spirit figures, which are also known as the Bradshaw paintings after the white pastoralist Joseph Bradshaw who came across the paintings in the 1890's and shared them with the wider world. There were also paintings of Wanjina, the creator spirits in the Kimberly, as well as amazing art work with important cultural and environmental information.
We ended up spending quite a lot of time in the pool and admiring the art, so we actually used quite a lot of the extra time we had bought for ourselves by booking the helicopter back, so we had to motor so we didn't miss the flight 😝. Continuing on we made it back to the main path and found 'Big Merten Falls', or at least the cliff where it falls from! Its very hard to get a shot of the falls themselves, as they are VERY high!!
After Bunjani we went on to find the 'lily pond' which was filled with, you guessed it, gorgeous water lilies.
I'm not going to lie, despite reading several different descriptions and looking at a couple of maps I still hadn't really gotten my head around where and how we would come to Punamii Uunpuu, so I was expecting to arrive at the base of the falls. Instead we arrived at a wide but shallow river that we worked out we would need to wade across to get to both the viewing point for the falls and the helipad for our ride home.
Once we deposited our bags at the shaded benches that we assumed were the boarding gate for the helicopters we followed the signs around the corner to see the falls in all their glory.
We headed back for some peanut butter and nutella sandwiches (lunch of champions!) and then Josie and I decided to have a quick dip to cool down before the flight back. There wasn't anyone else swimming, or indeed any signs saying we were allowed to swim, but thankfully some other walkers who were waiting for their ride back to the campsite let us know that we were indeed allowed to jump in, so off we went!
With our take off time fast approaching we jumped out and got dried and dressed super quickly. Toby and Nora were very excited to tell us about the young monjon that one of the helicopter pilots had pointed out to them. Apparently the pilots had noticed a family the creatures, the smallest of all the rock wallabies, last season, but hadn't seen them around as yet this season. So the pilot was super excited to see one again, and said he was pretty sure it was one of the babies from last season all grown up!
And then it was time to board the 2 choppers required to take us back to base camp. I was legit terrified - poor Toby got stuck with me and I nearly broke his hand by squeezing it so tightly for all 6 minutes of the flight. But it really was breathtaking and spectacular, and it did give us a whole new appreciation of the river systems and the falls, seeing them from above. In the other chopper Nora was very grateful to be in the co-pilot chair, because it came with a door (unlike the two seats in the back!) and Josie came very close to jumping out of her skin with excitement - she LOVED it!!
After 6 of the most thrilling minutes of our lives we were back on solid ground and staring down another 2 hours of really tough driving to get back to our campsite. We made it back just as the sun was setting, although unfortunately not exactly in one piece 😱. More on that in the next installment.....