Gibb River Road

Today was a big drive. We had to get from Mount Hart Lodge to Home Valley Station and while it isn’t a huge distance, about 450kms, the Gibb River Road is very rough.

The Road was originally made for cattle transport and while it is still used for that it is also popular with tourists. Most people on the road are grey nomads with their 4 wheel drives there were only a couple of other buses like ours. The Road itself is closed for much of the year due to the wet season floods but during the dry it is graded and then reopened. The bus handled it OK but the corrugations meant it vibrated furiously for most of the trip making it impossible to talk to anyone as it was so noisy.

We were on our way early and the first stop was at Galvans Gorge to stretch the legs. Today was also the first real cool morning we have had but it soon warmed up. Galvans Gorge is pretty good, not as spectacular as Bell Gorge.

While the country looks very dry there is actually a lot of water around with rivers and creeks either still flowing or with large pools. We crossed the Durack and a number of other rivers on our trip. There were also loads of wild cattle around which you had to be careful of as they tend to wander onto the road.

We have seen some local wildlife during our trip, a rock wallaby at Bell Gorge, dingoes around Mount Hart, more wallabies around Mount Hart, and lots of birds. Unfortunately at Home Valley Station we saw our first cane toad.

Home Valley Station is run by the Government as an indigenous training area and is hugely popular with loads of campers and holiday makers camping or staying in the motel style accommodation. It is located on the Pentecost River flood plain and is a working cattle station. On the road into the Station we stopped to watch the sun set on the Cockburn Ranges which turned red and orange as the sun went below the horizon.

Dinner was steak (of course) and it was excellent. We were in the motel style accommodation for the night and our room even had its own insect-control officer (a gecko). Tomorrow we are on to Kununurra.Read more