In our original plan we were going to stay at a campground in Keep River NP, but due to it being a bit hot and with nowhere to cool off without perhaps being eaten but crocs, we did a day visit while were staying at Lake Argyle. Susan planned to get us up early, 5:30am, have a quick breakfast, and 70kms drive over to Keep River in the NT by 7:00am, so we could be walking early before it got too hot. Seemed like a great plan except that Susan set her phone alarm to 5:30 Brisbane time, two hours ahead of WA time. There were a few grrr’s from within our camper when the alarm went off at 3:30am! We went back to sleep and got going a little later than planned, but it didn’t matter, as a cool change had blown in overnight, making it not so hot. This has been the first bit of relief of the constant over 35 degC day temperature we’ve being having, and we were glad to have it.

Keep River NP is another nice relatively small park that is in on the WA border with the familiar rock formations set in large flood plains. Again similar to the Bungle Bungles in parts, it’s all part of the Devonian reef structure that was around millions of years ago which borders the Kimberley region. With quite a nice cooler wind blowing, we headed off for a 3 hour loop walk of the Jarnem region of the park. First hour of the walk was to a lookout that gave a 360 degree view of the surrounding area. We then continued for another hour to a rock art location right up against the dome type formations. Most of the rock art had deteriorated, but it was very scenic walking close along the rocks. It was another hour back to the car, so we headed off. As we were passing a large stand of trees along the flood plain, a hundred or so red tailed cockatoos took off, trying their hardest flying into a stiff breeze. I’ve never seen so many cockatoos in a single group like that. It was pretty cool. We got back to the car and headed back to Lake Argyle, stopping into the ranger’s station for a short walk to Cockatoo Lagoon. It was a pleasant surprise to find a long narrow lagoon, filled with water and hundreds of Water Lilies flowering. It would’ve been nice to see it last light (with better pictures), but we headed off back to camp for lunch.

The next day we moved on a couple of hundred kms on Tuesday, back into the Northern Territory, to Timber Creek. From here we spent a day in Gregory NP. A lot the park roads and tracks are closed due to wet season flood damage, so we had only a few things to see. After a slow morning, we packed lunch and headed 60 kms into the park to some strange limestone formations. At a lookout we viewed the ‘White Waterfall’, formed by some sort of reaction of the water rushing over the rocks. We then moved onto the abandoned Bullita Homestead for lunch. It sits on the Baines river and was given up after a large flood in the late seventies. It’s part of the NP now and they are restoring some lovely old stockyards by the homestead.

I wanted to visit Jasper Gorge on the Buchanan Hwy on the way back. I found a 4WD ‘short cut’ across to the road that was only 20 kms long and open, so that was handy. It was only a short cut by distance, not time as it was very rough, rocky and slow going I think it took us 90 mins to travel the 20 kms! Jasper Gorge is not as spectacular as others, and off the beaten track, but worth seeing.

Back to Timber Creek and up the Escarpment track to a lookout over-looking the town and Victoria River, off to Gregory’s Tree to get a photo of  a magnificent Boab with a great name, and finally feeding some ‘freshies’ less than 100m from our tent rounds off our visit to here.

Pack-up tomorrow for Katherine our next stop.

Did you know … #11?

When a crocodile has its mouth open while basking in the sun, it’s cooling its peanut sized brain!

Timber Creek

Show options Hide options Additional options

Avoid highways Avoid tolls KM Miles

Get Directions Print Directions