King Julian and The Pigeon Lookout

It’s day three in El Questro. I am up early but no rush this morning so I whip up some pancake mix and make some thin crepes, cover them with hot buttered walnuts, a generous drizzle of honey and a squeeze of lemon. Perfecto.

Jen, Andrew and Anne revisit Zebedee Springs this morning whilst I hang around El Questro Station with my laptop and other gadgets to communicate with the outside world. I put a couple of loads of washing on, grab myself a double shot latte from the cafe and find a power point to plug my power board and all my gadgets in to charge them up.

The guys return before lunch and we drive back to camp for a lazy afternoon. Sometimes you just need to put feet up and rest for a while.

Later in the afternoon, it’s time to make our way to sunset. First, it’s a short drive from camp on a perfectly graded road to the jetty at Chamberlain Gorge. This is where the boat cruises depart from up the Chamberlain River. On our way, we finally spot the exclusive El Questro Homestead up from the jetty on the bend of the Chamberlain River.

There’s a famous photo of the Homestead from a vantage point and Andrew thinks it’s from Branco’s Lookout where the Pentecost and Chamberlain Rivers meet.

We drive to the river crossing where a giant Boab tree sits and inspect the road ahead. The crossing is very bumpy with big boulders to navigate although little river water remains in the crossing.
It’s difficult terrain all the way up to Branco’s Lookout so myself and and Jen decide not to attempt the crossing. There’s been a recent sighting of a 4.5m salty crocodile in the river so best not getting stuck and having to toss a coin to see who gets out to push the car...!

Andrew and Anne are keen and cautiously attempt the crossing with success and continue on. As it takes a while for the return trip, we arrange to meet back at camp and then go to Pigeon Hole Lookout for sunset.

The turn off for Pigeon Hole Lookout is a short distance from where we left the Lloyde’s so we decide to drive the 9.3km 4WD track to the lookout as it was 4.30pm and the sun was already dropping. Jen grabs the walkie talkie to let the Lloyde’s know... “copy King Julian”, Andrew’s newly appointed name. There’s no response so obviously we are too far apart.

After crossing a couple of creeks, we reach a steep hill section which looks tricky but the Toyota Prado does it fine. Slow and steady, we reach the lookout and are treated to magnificent views overlooking a valley on a bend in The Pentecost River. The sun is creeping it’s way behind the hill so we set up with a cider and Corona, perch ourselves on a bench fashioned from old timber and enjoy the view.

Keerrrr.... copy King Julian, can you hear me King Julian. Still no reply. We meet a couple at the lookout and ask to use their CB radio but Andrew and Anne don’t reply and are still out of range. The couple set off in their 4WD as they want to be down well and truly before sunset and then they suddenly reverse back up the hill... “I think we heard him, King Julian on the radio” like now he’s infamous in these parts.

Thanks mate I reply but what you heard was me calling King Julian again... ha!

So we settle in for sunset and take some fab pics. Suddenly on the radio we here “King Julian here, over”. We have finally made contact to tell the Lloyde’s we are at Pigeon Lookout so they are on their way up just before the sun disappears.

We enjoy our final sunset over El Questro together and return to camp before dark.

All hail King Julian.Baca lagi