Wednesday 20th June - Kununnura to El Questro Station

Back to the tent

Back in internet range for the first time for nearly a week [post done on 25/6/12].

Reflections at Chamberlain Gorge, El Questro Station WA

We set off with the tent again to stay on El Questro Station, which covers 1 million acres of the Kimberley.  Being enterprising, the owners have branched out from just being a cattle station to hosting tourism on their property.  Quite expensive but the camp site is very good and the setting beautiful.  We are much better at the tent erecting and general camp setting up now and had it all done in about 20 minutes.

In the afternoon we went for a cruise on the Chamberlain Gorge.  This gorge was seriously re-arranged by nature a couple of wet seasons ago when the flood waters hit 20 metres! All the vegetation was stripped off the sides and a lot more rocks were washed downstream.  Despite this the gorge is still lovely.  We saw the usual wildlife of freshies, agile wallabies and various birds.  We also saw many fish attracted to the surface with food.  This included 3 barramundi one of which was huge, about a metre in length.  These are curious fish, they all start life as males in the river estuaries.  The young fish swim upstream and when they reach a size of between 55cm and 80cm they go downstream to saltwater to breed as males.  After this they change sex and become female for the rest of their lives.  The most interesting of the other fish was the seven spot archer.  They spit water to bring down insects above the surface, but are happy to shoot a stream of water into your face if you lean over the boat.  I got soaked!

 Chamberlain Gorge, El Questro Station WA

 Chamberlain Gorge, El Questro Station WA