Out of season rain, Mitchell Falls campsite no longer free, more feedback and updates from readers.

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Out of season rain, Mitchell Falls campsite no longer free, more feedback and updates from readers.
June 27, 2008

Hi,

Did anyone get caught out by the overcast and rainy days?

Everybody here was holding their breath, wondering if we get a real disaster again like last year. I've just been to the NT for two weeks, and we also had a couple of overcast days just last week and it looked like rain. This was about two weeks after the rain in the Kimberley.

This really isn't supposed to happen. I wonder if it's going to become a regular thing...

Anyway, my apologies to everyone who tried to contact me during that time. Unexpectedly I did not have a chance to get on the net at all while away, so I kept some people waiting for quite some time! I have since caught up with all email, so if you wrote and you didn't get an answer then either your email or my reply got lost somewhere. Please do write again.

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More and more reports are now starting to come back from people who have returned from their trips. Thanks to everyone who has been writing, ringing, or even making the effort to come out here to see me! And sorry to the people who tried but missed me while I was away.

We'll make sure we catch up next time, ok?

Thanks for all of the enthusiastic feedback you sent, and thanks especially to the people who are sending in all those little updates and corrections. Your help is invaluable and I appreciate it very much!

So what's new and what has changed?

Unfortunately the Mitchell Falls campsite is no longer free. It now costs $6.50 per person per night.

The reader who alerted me to that also thought the camp was uninspiring. (I myself didn't think so when I was up there.)

And he provided some more detailed guidance to get to the Edward River Camps and the nearby Aboriginal art sites. In his words:

-- the King Edward River campsites are easy to miss. Camp 2 is 2.8 Km from the crossing and Camp 1 is 3.1 Km, both on the right coming from the crossing. Camp 1 is a nicer site.

-- the aboriginal art sites around the KER crossing can be located as follows. The first turnoff is just 200 m from the crossing on the left. The second is 6.3 Km from the crossing on the right and is more difficult to find when you get there. You need to go through the little personnel gate and follow the tracks to the rock outcrops. The burial site is off to the the right before the gate and around behind the big rock outcrop about in line with the fenceline with the gate.

Other feedback that has been coming in:

-- The guys at the EKT camp in the Bungles get regular thumbs up from readers.
-- Seafood at the wharf in Broome is apparently now ridiculously overpriced.
-- But how good is the Aarli Bar!
-- The Azuki Fusion Japanese Restaurant is SENSATIONAL - yum yum. (Broome)
-- Tumblegoodiron and Pushups are BEAUTIFUL spots.
-- Camping at Sawpit Gorge was magic.
-- The Cape Leveque Road was much better than anticipated.
-- Same for the road to Mornington. The sanctuary is wonderful and becoming more popular (= more people).

(Now people will expect great roads there and the next feedback will be about how horrible they really are... It's all in the perception.)

Everybody loves the Bungles and my sense of orientation sucks.
(The latter isn't really an update, I knew that.)
Very sorry about the east/west confusion that crept into a couple of sections. E.g. the directions to get to Pushups. Turn west, not east.

One reader kindly pointed out that driving west from Broome would take him to Madagascar and not to Kununurra as I suggested, but that after some initial confusion he fixed the problem by re-reading that section while standing on his head. Way to go!

(The other instances where I messed up were very embarrassing for me but wouldn't have prevented you from finding things, so, um, I won't repeat them here.)

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