Derby-West Kimberley

Another huge day in the car saw us traverse the 600+ km from Kununurra to Fitzroy Crossing - not all bad when the temperature outside was soaring to 37 degrees! Besides a cool hollowed out boab tree, and the cliffs at Ngumbin, it was a pretty unremarkable drive. We filled time with music, food, audio book, more food, more audio book and then the kids got creative on their whiteboards - for $3 each at Kmart, we've well and truly got our money's worth out of them on this trip! We arrived in Fitzroy Crossing just before 4pm - enough time to fit in a swim in the lovely pool (not freezing cold like many of the others we've been in!) before relaxing under a shady tree for dinner.
On Sunday we decided to head out to check out Tunnel Creek - 40km of bitumen + 65km of corrugated dirt seemed reasonable for a day trip and it didn't disappoint! Despite the great scenery along the gravel road, the kids were starting to moan about the corrugations...however after we completed the walk through the Tunnel there was unanimous agreement that it was definitely worth the drive!
The walk itself was quite short (about 2km return) but virtually all of it is within the Tunnel Creek cave system. We walked through the creek at some points (sharing the space with the glowing red eyes of freshwater crocs!), marvelled at the stalactites and flowstones in the cave ceiling which reached many metres overhead and enjoyed spotting the tunnel openings at the half way mark and end point (there really was light at the end of the tunnel!). We were very grateful for our trusty hiking sandals and head torches - not sure we would have made it very far into the dark recesses of the cave without them!Read more