The park is a very transient one where people only stay for a night before moving either north or south. When we arrived yesterday at 4, the place was fairly full. By 10 am there was us and one other in the park. However by the time we got back for our swim it was filling up again.
The view of then park, not a 2WD in sight!
Our camp and view
Being so close to the Archer River the park has been effected by rising water. The picture below is from the roadhouse looking towards the river. The river is a further 50 metres or so past the last tree in the picture. On the wall of the building is the mark where the river came to in two cyclones, a massive 14 metres or so above normal! Simply amazing.
The dangers of water crossings is evident by the ute that is currently sitting washed up on the crossing, happened in February this year when the driver thought they could pass through the crossing with the river at 1.6 m metres above the concrete crossing! Silly bugger got washed off immediately, the driver survived, but unfortunately his passenger was not so lucky. Struck the community pretty hard. The car will be there for a few more weeks yet or may hang around till the wet takes it away. It's been stripped of anything useful already, if it's above surface, it's gone.
After breakfast and journals which seemed to take for ever, even with the bribe of swimming afterwards, we went down to river for a rest and relax.
Time seem to disappear and before we knew it was 3pm.
Our chillax for the afternoon There were a few moments of excitement, Griffin floating a little too far and nearly going under the bridge and a group of campers making their way south dropping into this free camp area and setting up. Six cars in total rocking up. We shuffled so that they could fit in and the kids had a ball together for a further 30 minutes till it was time to head back to Ernie.
We retired to Ernie for some refreshments whilst the boys had a quick shower with Mum. On return we then popped up to the roadhouse, Uncle Chris was shouting us dinner in the roadhouse! The boys pigged out on super healthy chips with sauce and washed it down with coke ... So lucky. Clearly they don't get cans every day as how they poured the coke into cups was delightful. The parents opted for an "Archer burger" each, a good 3 inches high with all the major food groups covered! Katie washed this down with a glass of wine. We had to buy the whole bottle as they didn't sell it in anything other than 2L casks! We certainly looked liked tourists drinking wine in this joint! The boys just had a XXXX ....
After dinner we returned to Ernie to build a fire for damper cooking. Somewhat successful but the boys weren't keen on hanging onto a stick in the fire, the older boys did one and outsourced the holding to the camp oven.
The result : Yum!
Forgot to mention that we also booked in our dates for our stay at the top in Seisa and Pundands Bay. Should be back in phone coverage by then so will touch base with fam and friends if we can.
Tomorrow we off to Morton Telegraph Station for some Barramundi finishing in the Wenlock!
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