Day 15 Karijini National Park Day 2

Hancock Gorge.

Wading through the gorge to get to the end.

Weano Gorge and Handrail Pool.

A spinifex pigeon.

Hamersley Gorge, and the folded rock.

Late afternoon sun as we hiked the rim.

Our bush campfire.

Saturday, September 24^th

I was up in the middle of the night and I was amazed how quiet it was, no bugs, no sounds of anything, until I opened the zipper on my tent, which made a loud noise and the crunch of the stones under my feet as I walked past the other tents on the way to the toilet.

I woke up early with the sun. I was the only one up other than Damien and while I was eating my oranges, he gave me a banana and then a couple of strawberries and some blueberries. He cannot afford to buy them for the group but, he gets a few for his stash because he gets sick of eating the same breakfast everyday.

I went for a short walk around and through the camp enjoying the atmosphere. There are spinifex bushes all over and you have to be careful walking around them because, the little pieces are sharp and stick in your bare skin. Damien had said earlier when I asked about walking in the bush and the chance of meeting one of Australia's deadly snakes “Don't worry about the snakes, it's the spinifex that will get you first!”

Later when everyone got up he made bacon and eggs. I sat with Gudrun, Anja and Albert, and we enjoyed the early morning warmth from the rising sun. It is quite a bit cooler here than a couple of days ago. I need my sleeping bag now and a jumper (sweater).

The first hike today was at Hancock Gorge, which was the most challenging yet. There was a steep descent into the gorge including some almost vertical ladders. When we got to the bottom we walked through the gorge until it narrowed so much that all there was two steep walls and water between. In a couple of places we had to wade or swim through the water to go through, and at two other places we had to put our left arm and leg on the left wall and right arm and leg on the other side and walk spider-like to get through until we reached another beautiful pool. Again the water was quite cool and little sunlight reached us. There was a chained barrier that prevented us from descending further because it was too dangerous to go without climbing equipment. We had to repeat the process to get back out.

The second hike was at Weano Gorge and Handrail Pool. The gorge was very narrow and a bit treacherous to get through and at the end there was a metal handrail to help us negotiate our way down to the pool. This was a lovely cool shaded place. I followed another man who was a volunteer at the park. He swam across the pool and climbed over a rocky little island to water on the other side. I followed him. We swam through a narrow gorge for about a hundred metres to a smaller pool with some sun. It felt nice to lay in the sun on the rock while we chatted about his job as a volunteer. There was a stop sign here and again we were not allowed to travel further in.

Then we returned to camp for lunch and to prepare dinner. My group was on duty and we helped Damien prepare the kangaroo stew in the Turkish bedroll. He is repeating the menu from the first part of the trip, but I'm not complaining, it's all good.

Then we drove for an hour to Hamersley Gorge for our third hike of the day. This was an easier hike through a quite different area. Instead of level horizontal bands of shale this area showed evidence of the folding of the earth caused by teutonic pressures. When we got to the basic camping area Damien had us set up a site for dinner and a firepit. Some people collected firewood and I arranged a bunch of rocks into a circle for the fire. I went for a short walk and came across a true bushman's camp. Just a swag on a cot with a plastic sheet as an awning.

Then we hiked down and had a great swim in the cool waters. This was a short easy hike to perhaps the largest and last swimming pool. We could see lots of fish in the water. Again you could swim along another channel for a couple hundred metres.

Then we got out and hiked back to the truck which we drove back to the campfire area we had prepared. The sun was setting and the air temperature was falling and since we were all wet we were getting cool. Damien used his eucalyptus stick, a string and base to start the fire the old fashion way. He was really proud that he was successful because he'd tried a couple of times earlier and it didn't work. We built a large bonfire and quickly warmed up. While Damien finished the stew and made a damper (loaf of bread) in the fire and potatoes in the coals we sat around and had a couple of drinks with the only other camper there, before enjoying a great dinner under the star ladden sky. The Milky Way was very obvious. Then we had the hour drive back to our tents where we crashed quite quickly as it was about 10.