Gnylmarung Retreat

Getting out of the caravan park in Broome turned out to be a bit difficult as our van was tucked around a low hanging tree which was a tricky place to get it out of, and wasn’t helped by another caravan (Kedron) pulling up blocking us from going out the wrong way, which is what I had planned on doing. So with the help of about 5 other campers we managed to get it out without hitting the tree. There were instructions flying around everywhere, I guess we provided them with some morning entertainment.

We tried to buy some of Matso's Chilli Beer as it's really amazing stuff. Unfortunately they don't bottle it and only have it on draft. What a shame.

We left Broome as planned and headed up the Cape Leveque Road. Well if you call it a road I think you’re making it sound better than it is. Is 98kms of very rough dirt track, wide yes, rough yes. After 98kms they have tarred it the rest 100kms all the way to the top of Cape Leveque which is One Arm Point.

We went past Beagle Bay although it’s very interesting there’s no need for us to go in there as we’ve been there at least twice before.

Once we got half to Cape Leveque we then drove 25kms across some more corrugations to Gnylmarung Retreat, which is an aboriginal owned community which has a very nice camping area. When we drove in Alfonso the aboriginal that owns it came out to greet us. He was very nice and showed us the two options they had reserved for us. Grant the Manager also turned up, we think he’s also aboriginal decent, but kind of hard to be sure.

They provide free firewood here and also have a free laundry, showers and toilets with running water at the van. So not bad, but at $40/night for the 2 of us it’s a bit on the top end. But all the aboriginal communities on Cape Leveque (Dampier Peninsular) charge the same, even if they aren’t as good as this place. The community is also very spotless, which is nice, no dumped cars or old machines lying around. The have a free satellite phone here provided by the Government i.e. our taxes, and you can make free calls to anywhere in Australia except mobiles! I wonder what you have to do to qualify for a free community phone? We have mobile service for internet, but not phone calls. I think if I climbed up the hill I could get service here.

So we selected the hardest place they have to get a caravan into but it also has the best views over a small pristine bay with white sand and turquoise water. It only took 4 goes for me to get the van in the right position for Jayne! Sitting at our van we are constantly watching the pelicans feeding on the streams of jumping whiting. Our spot is very protected from the wind, so we are enjoying this. With daytime temperatures topping 30⁰C and night time getting down to 14⁰C it’s a nice place, a bit chilly in the mornings but 1 hour with the diesel heater on and then the sun has warmed up everything nicely.

We went fishing of the rocks and Jayne caught her 1^st fish with her new fishing rod. It was at least big enough to keep for bait, as we’re running out of prawns. I caught some as well but not big enough to keep.

Yesterday we drove to “Whale Song” which is about 15kms from us here and also an aboriginal community that has camping. They don’t allow caravans in there as their road doesn’t have enough clearance and is too narrow. I didn’t necessarily believe them, so we went to have a look, and yes you can't get a caravan in there. They have a nice café right on the top of the cliff where we enjoyed coffee and cake for $29, well you have to remember where we are and to be able to get proper coffee and homemade cakes with fresh cream is quite unusual. Mind you, we have cappuccinos in our van every day courtesy of our Nespresso machine and generator.

Whale Song has red sand cliffs dropping down to white sand, so the outlook is very different than here. The red cliffs are always spectacular.

While we were at Barn Hill Station we saw whales off in the distance, but as yet haven’t seen them again. We keep looking though.

We leave Gnylmarung Retreat this Sunday and head to One Arm Point to camp in the Gambanan Camp which is supposed to be really special. It will have to be to top this place!

We’ve had to do some minor adjustments on the van due to all the corrugations, the boat motor needed a new way of being tied down and the bikes will have to be tightening up on the roof of the car before we leave here. Certainly the Gibb River Road will test out how well everything is secured so its nice to have a test run 1^st. On the bad corrugations we have the tyre pressure down to 20-25psi (140-170kpa) and the drive at around 40kms/hour, so they are pretty bad corrugations and they go for miles!