​June 12-17 Borroloola

Home sweet home!

Typical of Savannah grasslands. We look out on this from our van. Quite lush at the moment. I believe during the wet the caravan park is an island with the river flowing around parts of its perimeter. That would be a sight!

We have been hunkered down in Borroloola for quite a few days and have really enjoyed it. It's rather an interesting, albeit not entirely pretty, place with a surprising history. When I say surprising, that is entirely due to my ignorance - up till now and now I am even more impressed! The place has been on my 'places to visit' list since we first came to the Gulf country 7 years ago. Back then from Burketown, situated near the Qld-NT border and another frontier town with its own fascinating difficult past, I looked west along the Savannah Way on the map and saw Hells Gate and Borroloola. I decided then and there to one day go there. With names like that, who wouldn't?
The town of Borroloola was established in the 1880s and currently has a pop of about 1000 made up of non-aboriginal plus four main aboriginal communities/distinct language groups. It's situated on the mighty McArthur River 50k upstream from the Gulf where Bing Bong Port is located - on Bing Bong Creek of course! Just love that name, makes me laugh. Zinc and lead are loaded and shipped out of that port. Maybe other ores also as the region is rich in many minerals including gold, diamonds, silver, tin, copper as well as shale and oil. Most of these were discovered back on the late 1800s but are only now been mined economically. I was flabbergasted to learn that Australia's largest diamond weighing in at 104 carats was found here about 15 years ago. Super eh!?

Port Bing Bong with Gulf in the background from the viewing tower.

Port Bing Bong from 'the beach'.

We've explored lots of the roads around here over the last few days not to mention the road to Caranbirini Conservation reserve and its magnificent rock formations. We've driven down every water access road we could find, mostly that's been onto the McArthur or Batten river/creek. These are huge rivers and one can only wonder at the volume of water they carry during the wet. We drove up to the port and to a small creek, Mule Creek - 100m wide! Hello!? we are definitely in big water country here. We even managed a walk on the shore of the Gulf - at low tide and way beyond where a croc would want to come. That in itself was pretty specky as so much of the Gulf is mangrove or totally inaccessible - says she who knows so little of its coastline.

The Gulf of Carpentaria, or part thereof, viewed from a safe distance from the water. Sorry you'll have to zoom in to see the water 😞 These waters are home to big croc - as well as the gentle dugong and turtle.

Thought I'd add a bit of fluff! We were surrounded by 'pipecleaner bushes. The dropped 'flowers' were gathered like polystyrene balls in protected hidey holes. Took me a while to work out what they were

There are quite a few small island groups off shore in this area, e.g., the Sir Edward Pellew group which we would have dearly loved to visit. One is a National park where turtles nest. Sadly without a boat we're stumped. Haven't entirely given up but I think it's a dream for another day. If you're interested you can volunteer to help out at the annual turtle monitoring camp on West Island: Note to self.
It's been quite a revelation visiting this place and a wonderful experience. You should try it!