We were up early and on the road to head for the WA border.  Many of you may have seen the news that the day before there were queues 6km long and people having to wait up to 4 hours to cross the border - this was because there was a Telstra outage in the Kimberley region and it slowed the whole process right down.

Our crossing was quite different to that.  From the time we pulled up at the checkpoint to when we were into WA was less than 15 minutes.  Mind you I had followed instructions and redid our G2G passes and had complied with all the quarantine regulations.  We knew from John and Carol that they had to ditch some firewood they were carrying.  We had a couple of tubs and figured they'd tell us whether or not it was acceptable - it wasn't so they showed us where to dump it - along with quite a pile. They could have had a decent bonfire!  So we drove into Kununurra and stopped at the shops there to replenish our supplies.  The town was really busy but still friendly and laid back.  We then drove on to Wyndham where we had a booking.  We got set up, caught up with John and Carol briefly and then set off for a bit of local exploring. We checked out the Marlgu billabong - really pretty with amazing birdlife and the old telegraph station ruins.  There are lots of boab trees here and I just love them so be warned they will feature greatly in many pics!  We came back into town and checked out the old Port Wyndham then made our way up to Five Rivers lookout.  The view of five rivers - Ord, Forrest, King, Pentecost and Durack is fantastic and its a great spot to watch the sunset.  We were armed with a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses and managed a few arty farty shots, though it probably wasn't as spectacular as it can be. We came back to the van and had tea then went over to catch up with John and Carol.  We half watched State of Origin but mostly talked about there we'd each been and where we were going to head next.  

The first next was back to Kununurra the next day where Carol managed to get us into Hidden Valley CP.  We got ourselves set up there and set off on our first adventure.  We went out to Ivanhoe crossing and the boys got to play in the water.  I think we did the crossing either five or six times.  John has a go pro and they experimented putting it in front of them, then behind them to capture our crossing, then behind us to capture their crossing.  Great fun.  From there we headed out to Black Rock falls which would be spectacular when they're in flow but its now a bit too late in the dry season but it was still an awesome rock formation. The scenery here is absolutely breathtaking and it seems that every time you turn a corner or crest a hill there's another wow moment.  From Black Rock we came back to Hoochery which is a rum and gin distillery. We had a tasting paddle each - rum for Craig and gin for me and we also got a nibbles paddle and the four of us sat in the sun and savoured it all.  Along the road was the Sandalwood shop so we checked that out before heading back into town to the Tourist information centre.  They were so helpful and we managed to get booked onto the Sunset Cruise on Lake Argyle - that happens on Monday!  A quick stock up of some groceries and back to camp for happy hour and dinner.  In another of those small world moments, Craig saw this couple walk past our van and he said is that George from Line 3 - I knew exactly who he meant and thought it did look like him but then we decided it wasn't.  Later in the afternoon this same guy was setting up his van two up from us and I came past and thought it really was him so said George? and it was indeed him.  BSL readers may remember George  - I think his surname was Stephenson - he was a sparkie with Line 3 Maintenance for many years and just retired in the last lot of redundancies.  

Next day we'd decided to head out to El Questro on the Gibb River road.  We're not going to do the Gibb this trip as we don't have all terrain tyres on the car and we want to see the other route anyway.  But the drive to ELQ is mostly bitumen anyway but then we got talking to the lady in the information centre who'd told us how pretty the Pentecost river crossing was so we headed out there first and the boys once again played in the water while Carol and I took a few million photos.  We came back and turned down the El Quester road and made it to Zebedee Springs which closes at 12 noon (don't know why).  But we had plenty of time for a soak in the lovely warm water surrounded by soaring cliffs and majestic palm trees.  Seems so bizarre finding a rainforest in the middle of the outback.  It was another big day and we came back to the info centre and finalised our booking for a flight and landing in the Bungle Bungles on Wednesday.  Both our vans have dual axles so aren't allowed in to the national park. We've heard that the drive in is really rough at the moment and though only 50km is taking up to two hours making a day trip a bit of a production.  So we thought what the hell - lets do it in style - so you'll hear all about it in a future post.  Back to camp and a drink or two then tea.

Yesterday we were on the road before 8.30am to head out here to Lake Argyle.  We knew that they don't take bookings for unpowered sites - you just queue up and they call you when a spot becomes available.  But right now there are so many people wanting to get there that at 9.15 when we arrived they already had 80 on the waitlist and weren't taking anymore names.  However the park attendant was very helpful and told us in a roundabout way (without compromising himself) that if we were parked across the road (which we were) and stayed there overnight, we could be at the gate at 6.45 the next morning and get our names on the list.  Meanwhile we could buy a $10 day pass each and enjoy all the facilities.  So we parked up and spent a fabulous day.  We'd an early lunch in the beer garden then back to get our bathers and had a swim in the very famous infinity pool.  It is truly wonderful and though we'd been warned it was freezing - it actually wasn't too bad and we floated around in there for an hour or so taking another squillion pics.  Then it was onto the grassy area looking out over the lake listening to a singer/guitarist while sipping our own drinks and nibbles.  Absolute bliss.  We then headed back to change out of our bathers, freshen up and back to the beer garden for some tea and listen to the singers second session.  What a great night.  

So we spent last night in our van in a red dirt layby but still perfectly comfortable then at around 6.30 Carol and I headed down to the park attendants spot - along with about 30 other people to wait for them to start taking names.  Because we'd stayed overnight in the lay-by we got our names on first so now I'm sitting here typing this while I wait for a phone call to say there's a spot available for us.  The attendant reckoned it wold be at least 10am.   By the time we were walking back to the van the queue on the roadside of new arrivals must have been at least a kilometre long!  So I'll leave you there and next time tell you all about our sunset cruise and our trip to the Bungle Bungles.