Karijini National Park – Day 2
I slept 100x better last night than I did the previous night – the heat of the fire kept me warm, and I only woke up once during the night. Regarding our tour group: at first I wasn’t “feeling it”, but people have grown on me and I’m actually very happy with who I’m with. The Irish girls, Bridget and Sorcha, are really cool and I love their strong Northern Ireland accents and frequent use of the word “brilliant”! The Irish boys, Dave and Johnny, are also cool and somehow I keep ending up sleeping between them in our sleeping arrangement. Our guide, Ben, is super chill and fits in well with this group of 20-somethings. In particular, the German girl, Sara, has been getting along well with him. We also picked up 3 other girls in Exmouth: Lindsey (30, Brit), Fanny (20′s, France) and Nicole (20′s, Canada), all really cool. Then there are 3 Japanese girls who do nothing but chatter in Japanese and laugh their heads off and take thousands of pictures. None of them knew each other before the trip but act as if they’re best friends. It’s the oddest thing. They don’t speak much English either. Then there are 3 40/50-something Germans who stick together.
And then there’s Ruth. I was rather indifferent to her from the start, though she stuck out like a sore thumb even on day 1 with her gruff demeanor and overall butch character. She’s from Melbourne, and she’s got short brown hair with streaks of yellow and red. She’d been fine up until last night, where she complained about the noise at night and kept telling us to keep the fire small. She definitely did not do her research on this tour because she just couldn’t accept the fact that she was on holiday with a bunch of 20-somethings who do enjoy the casual drink or two as well as pleasant campfire chatter before bedtime. I brought earplugs and would just pop them in whenever I wanted to sleep. She also brought earplugs, but refused to wear them and opted instead to complain about the noise every morning. And Ben was great, he’d totally play it off and suggest she sleep further away from the noise. Needless to say, the two of them did not get along too well. This would play out later on in the trip. And oh, did I mention Ruth was fond of hiking in her bathing suit sans pants or shorts? Or the fact that she supposedly is training for a marathon yet is lardy? It’s so puzzling. So basically, there was a division between her and the rest of us. She kept to herself a lot, and it was obvious that her tolerance for us was weaning as time passed.
ANYWAY, onto more beautiful topics of discussion, like Karijini. Day 2 turned out to be absolutely amazing. It began with Hancock Gorge, by far the most challenging and most rewarding. There was more stream-crossing and ledge-climbing, and of course the bright blue water nestled betweem the orange gorge walls. The ledge climbing was a bit scary again, but I survived. Then we began the Spiderwalk, where we had to shimmy with our legs spread over the water and our hands and feet on the narrow gorge walls until we reached some stepping stones in the water, at which point we could drop down. Scary! But then we reached Kermit’s Pool, by far the most beautiful area we’d seen in the gorges. It was a narrow area between gray gorge walls, with smooth gray slabs along the stream area, good for sitting on. Just beyond lay the pool, with a small window on the other side where the water continued on and our hike ended. The water was freezing, but some swam anyway. Poor Johnny dropped his camera in the water and it got carried into the pool, where Lindsey dove down and found it. I felt so bad!
Climbing back through the Spiderwalk was easier, though I was still shaking like crazy. Right after ascending the way we came, we headed down to the nearby Weano Gorge. There were warning signs before the start, highlighting the fact that fatalities occur and that a rescue would take 13 hours. Yikes. This gorge began with a hike through crotch-deep cold water, which I did sans shoes and it made my feet hurt. After that, we climbed more ledges and got to Handrail Pool. This end section called for a short descent down a waterfall via a handrail and rope. Ben was at the bottom helping us down by telling us where to place our hands and feet. Quite scary, but I did fine. The pool itself was freezing of course, but it was pretty much closed off by surrounding gorge walls so that when you looked up, you’d be looking at the sky through a window shaped by the gorge tops. Very relaxing. The hike back up the falls was easier, thankfully.
The second part of the day was spent driving through the Hammersley Range, an absolutely beautiful drive through the mountains, much like the scenic drive through the Pilbara en route to Karijini the other day. And once again, I was blown away by this incredible pallette of colors right in front of me in nature. Hammersley Gorge itself was just as colorful, with the typical gray slabs of smooth rock and then gorge walls with swirls of pink, red, purple, orange, etc. Brilliant. I finally decided to go for a swim and jumped into the freezing cold water, then swam to the other end where the rocks made a circular entryway into a warmer pool called Spa Pool, complete with a waterfall inside.
Nearby was another cold pool with a rope swing that I had previously decided I would try out. So fun, save for getting water up my nose. I think I definitely picked the right gorge to swim in.
And with that, we sadly said goodbye to Karijini. Everyone was pretty much in agreement that this was the highlight of the trip. It was absolutely stunning… yet was only really discovered in the 1980′s and consequently is probably Australia’s most underrated attraction.
Another gorgeous drive through the Hammersley, and then we drove through Wittenoom, a ghost town that had been abandoned due to asbestos mining and the health risks it posed to the residents there. Apparently a few die-hard Wittenoomians protested and have refused to leave the town despite this.
We randomly chose to setup camp in a dried-up riverbed full of stones. During the wet season, it gets to be a meter deep and the road that runs through it is impassible. See this is REAL Outback travel – having the freedom to camp in random spots surrounded by amazing scenery. After watching a lovely pink sunset, I enjoyed the warmth of the campfire while we had curry for dinner, followed by fruitcake and custard for dessert. I then went to bed around 9 out of boredom, and so I could be awake at sunrise. This turned out to be a bad idea, as I couldn’t fall asleep… and being confined in a swag means you can’t exactly move around much.
