To Karijini – Dales Gorge, Fortescue Falls and Fern Pool

Friday 16th May 2008

We packed up once again (no awning because we’d had shady trees, and basically, any excuse not to put it up and take it down is good enough for us!). Although I’d done a big job of cleaning up inside, everything on the outside is still covered in very fine red dust – all our nice clean clothes immediately took on an orangey hue.

A few last minute supplies were picked up in Tom Price (it’s a very friendly place with lots of green) such as today’s Australian newspaper – by 9:30!! It obviously came in with some miners or something but whatever, it made for a happy Paul.

I directed us to Dales Camp which is on the Eastern side of Karijini National Park for a couple of reasons – the Savannah camp sounded too big and touristy (being now next to the Eco Retreat), the girls’ friends families were at Dales Camp, if we were only doing 3 days (at Paul’s request) then I didn’t want to be setting up twice when the two main areas of the park are within driveable distance.

Driving into the park we saw our first dingo slinking along beside the road. It’s hard to distinguish them from a dog really but we were all suitably impressed at seeing a real wild one. Once in the camp we were told that they’ve been howling at night and scavenging around the sites – we’re really out in the wild.

Some people would be happy with the amount of space around each site but for Paul it was not a good thing and I have to say that it is a teensy bit bleak – and not very warm, either, probably ‘cos we are relatively high up.

After setting up, just as I was beginning to wonder how we were going to keep the girls entertained I heard kid’s voices and one in particular which sounded like little Gemma (2yrs old). I sent Katie off to investigate and she and Holly came racing back with Hannah and the news that Paige and Cate were also camped just a little bit further around the corner (although they were currently out). Well, that fixed everything. Pretty much whenever we were in camp there was at least one other set of children and they all had a great time making disgusting red dirt pies that meant they were continuously orange coloured from their heads to their toes (particularly their toes, in fact, which Paul likened to trolls’ feet!). They also made ‘food’ – it must have been for fairies or something because the bowls were mini gum nuts and they used even smaller ones for drinks with pieces of Spinifex for straws and fluff as the froth on the ‘fizzy’ drinks! Very inventive.

Once we’d had some nutritious salami sandwiches (well, that’s what Holly had) we headed off to investigate Dales Gorge. This involved negotiating a steep climb down to Fortescue Falls which was, however, well worth the effort. On one side the water rages down into a beautiful green pool whilst to the right the rocks come down in handy steps of various sizes but mostly big enough for a few people to catch the last rays of sun before it moved around and left the pool in shade. Holly and Paul ventured in but I could see it was cold so thought I’d leave it until/unless I got really hot (most unlikely). Katie wouldn’t contemplate it because she couldn’t see the bottom.

The girls found a brown snake hiding under some rocks but he must have been feeling shy because of his flaky skin and didn’t come out to bother us. I clambered over the top of the falls to get a better view and of course Holly followed me round because it involved danger... Actually – it was a very mild taste of things to come! (Yes, I am writing this with hindsight again).

We moved upstream to Fern Pool which has a small, but impressive, waterfall into a large, tranquil pool surrounded by lush vegetation and only limited access for us mere humans. We were allowed to swim there but were asked to respect the ‘sacred’ atmosphere by keeping noise to a minimum. Hah! Some chance with our two loud-mouths around! The colour of the pool was amazing and none of my photos do it justice – I’ll just have to use my memory – ahem!
I did swim in here – it’s supposed to be one of the warmest pools in the whole of the Karijini Park – mmm, well, warm isn’t quite how I’d describe it but I suppose there were some patches that were warmer than others. The water coming over the falls was definitely warmER but it came down with such a force that sitting under it wasn’t actually a pleasure.

We met up with Richard and Lynsey again here – Richard had just done a quick hike down the gorge to look for photographic opportunities and I was inspired to try it out but knew that neither of the girls would be very interested because we had also bumped into Brad, Denise, Cate and Paige and they were keen to get back to camp to play with them. Paul kindly agreed to accompany them while I went off for some rock-hopping.

It was a gorgeous hour or so – clambering through reeds and other greenery and over rocks and parts of the Fortescue river. Very picture-squew, I must say, and also nice to have some time to myself. I took a few photos but, once again, couldn’t get anything close to showing the splendour of the place.

That part of the river ends at Circular Pool which is like a huge cylinder has been taken out of the earth and another beautiful green pool placed at the bottom. The climb up out of the gorge was steep and even more precarious than the one at the other end but I thought diligently of how good it was for my thighs that have been neglecting their pilates exercises and ignored the rasping in my chest and made it safely to the top.

The walk back to camp was flat, hot and unexciting – except for watching some very industrious ants taking spinifex seed to their nests and leaving a big mound of husks around the entrance.

Having just come from town with our fresh supplies, Paul and I had extended an invitation to Richard and Lynsey to have dinner at our place so at 6pm they wandered down with extra plates, cutlery and cups and some all-important chilled white wine as well as a very large box of a red that went down rather too easily. The kids had macaroni cheese and were then shuffled inside to watch CBeebies on the laptop (Holly very gracefully conceded that Harry Potter might be a little too scary for the younger two). The adults didn’t really care what they were eating – it was just good to have company with a million things to talk about and a few bevvies to help things along. We really enjoyed their company and managed to ignore the cold until finally the laptop ran out of batteries and we admitted that our children really should go to bed!

Tonight we were ALL in sleeping bags and Paul even got out his beanie. I think he only put it on to prove me wrong because it wasn’t quite THAT cold! Oh, and we had a visit from the local dingo but didn’t hear her mates doing any howling.