Purnululu (The Bungle Bungles)

(Magyar összefoglaló a végén)


[We were out of mobile reception in the last 12 days, travelling to the Bungles and then on the Gibb River Road. Now we are back in civilzation, but it will take a few days to catch up with the blog. I will split it up to several parts. There is a lot to report...]


Friday, 22 June, Warmun - As the first step towards the Bungles, this morning we drove down to Warmun, about 200 kms South from Kununurra, and checked into the campsite at the Roadhouse. We will leave the van here tomorrow when we go into the Bungle Bungles, that is Purnululu National Park. We got here before midday and set up the van in a nice, shady but quite small space. There is nothing much to do here, the only attraction is an Aboriginal Art Centre, which we wanted to visit, but we found it closed. So we had an easy relaxing afternoon in the camp, doing some cooking and preparations for tomorrow. This will be our first night away from the van, using the tent, so we need to do a bit of thinking and repacking.

Creek crossing on the way to the Bungles

Sunday, 24 June, Warmun - We have just returned from a two-day trip to Purnululu, so now I have to summarise the last two days. Saturday morning we left the van in Warmun, and drove down to the NP. It is 53 km dirt road to reach the park, quite hard at some places but not really dangerous, just lots of tight curves, blind crests, quite a few water crossings and of course, dust and corrugations. Following the advice at the turn-off, I reduced the tyre pressure by 10 psi, and it did make the corrugations less uncomfortable indeed. The roads inside the NP are easier but still corrugated and dusty, and there are quite long distances to reach the various attractions.

Echidna Chasm

On Saturday we went to the North section of the park. We got to the car park at 11 and did the first walk, to Echidna Chasm. This is a narrow gorge going deep into a fault line in between 200 m high vertical rock walls with varying colour hues. Towards the end the two walls are no more than a metre apart. 

Mini Palms Gorge

After lunch we did the other walk on the North side, to Mini Palms Gorge. This one is a bit longer, to another narrow gorge with lots of palms and a large circular amphitheatre at the end. At some sections we had to squeeze through narrow gaps between large fallen rocks, fortunately we are thin enough to make it. I don't have the language skills to do justice to the scenery that we saw, all I will say is that it is amazing. Even the photos and videos we took can only show very little of the whole panorama. 

Our campsite

After the second walk we had to rush to the Kurrajong campground to set up our tent before sunset. We have not used this tent before so it took a while to do it and we missed the sunset walk. The evening was pretty cold, but we were well prepared. By 8 pm we finished dinner and we were happy to go to bed early. 

Sunday morning we got up as soon as the sun rose, around 6 am, had breakfast and packed up everything, which took about 2 hours, but just after 8 am we were on our way to the Southern part of the park, about 35 km away. We got to the car park around 9 am, and went on a walking tour including all the attractions around here. This is the most famous area of the park, all the pictures and commercials about the Bungle Bungles show these characteristic behive rock formations. 

Cathedral Gorge

We went around the Domes, to the Cathedral Gorge - my favourite of all we saw, a large amphitheatre with amazing acoustics - and then to a lookout to see more domes. By lunchtime we finished all the walks apart from the Piccaninny Gorge walk which is a several-day hike with bush camping, not our cup of tea. So after lunch and coffee we bid farewell to the Bungles and drove back to Warmun, the same way as we came. It took most of the afternoon, a pretty tiresom drive. In fact, the whole two days of the Bungles were pretty intense, but it was worth it, a wonderful experience. When we got back to our van at Warmun, we had a quick dinner after packing and rearranging all our gear and cleaning the car as much as we could from all the dust, then we went to bed early as we were dead tired.


Monday, 25 June, Cockburn Rest Area - This morning we went to check out the Art Centre in Warmun, but we did not find anything interesting. Then we left Warmun and drove back North, to the junction of the Great Northern and the Victoria Hwy, to this nice Cockburn Rest Area. We set up the van and had lunch and a bit of rest. 
Then we drove back to Kununurra, another 45 km back, to stock up before we embark on the Gibb River Road trip. We also visited an art gallery where I found what I was looking for: a large selection of engraved boab nuts. We saw some of these in the Kalumburu museum and I thought they would be a nice souvenir for this part of Australia. It was hard to chose one, but finally I picked one. We also dropped into the Argyle Diamonds shop, just to see what's on offer; there is plenty of nice gems but it was not hard to leave without buying anything...
By 5 pm we were back at the van, for a quiet evening. Tomorrow morning we head to the Gibb River Road!


Our itinerary can be seen at the following Google Map:
http://g.co/maps/wcwv8 
(Note that to see the route after Bowen, you need to move down to the bottom of the right panel, and select the following pages!)


[Az elmúlt 12 napban olyan helyeken jártunk ahol nem volt internet kapcsolat. Tegnap érkeztünk vissza "civilizált" környezetbe, és most egy ideig itt is maradunk a környéken, de bele fog telni egy pár napba amíg behozom a lemaradást. Több részletben fogom küldeni mert sok a mondanivaló és egyszerre nincs olyan sok idom írni.]


Múlt pénteken, jun. 22-én felszedtük a sátorfánkat Kununurra-ból és továbbmentünk dél felé a foúton kb 150 km-t egy Warmun nevu kis helyre. Itt megszálltunk egy kempingben 3 napra, legalábis a lakókocsit itt hagytuk, és másnap (szombat) reggel csak az autóval mentünk a közeli Purnululu nemzeti parkba, jobban ismert nevén a "Bungle Bungles"-hez. Ez az egyik leghíresebb nevezetesség ezen a vidéken, egy érdkes természeti képzodmény, sok-sok kúp vagy kaptár alakú sziklaformák, szuk kanyonok közel 200 m magas függoleges sziklafalak között, pálmaligetek,...


A parkhoz eljutni nem könnyu, 50 km földút, keskeny, erosen kanyargós, sok beláthatatlan bukkanóval, néhány patakon is át kell kelni. Ezért hagytuk a lakókocsit kint, ezt nem bírta volna. Maga a park is óriási terület, egy nap alatt nem tudtuk volna megnézni az összes látnivalót. Vittünk sátrat, gázfozot, minden szükséges felszerelést, és ott töltöttük az éjszakát sok más látogatóval együtt. Nem lett volna rossz, csak estére-éjszakára jó hideg lett, biztos tíz fok alatt. Alvás közben nem fáztunk, de az este meg a reggel nem volt kellemes. Azért túléltük, megfázás nélkül, és a látnivalók megérték a kellemetlenséget. Jó sokat kellett gyalogolni is, többnyire kiszáradt patakmederben, laza kavicson vagy nagyobb sziklákon mászni-kapaszkodni, jól elfáradtunk bele, de nagy élmény volt. Rendben vissza is értünk a foútra és az otthagyott lakókocsinkhoz vasárnap estére, jól esett ujra a kényelem. 


Másnap, hétfon reggel ujra felpakoltunk és visszamentünk északra, a Kununurra útelágazásig. Itt egy pihenoben meg lehet aludni egy éjszakára. Felállítottuk a lakókocsit, megebédeltünk, aztán itthagytuk a lakókocsit, és bementünk Kununurrába bevásárolni a "nagy útra". Másnap reggel elindultunk a Gibb River Road-on, egy majd 700 km hosszú földút a Kimberley régió közepén, ami felfuzi a környék legtöbb érdekes és híres nevezetességét. Ezt mondják Ausztrália utolsó igazi természetes vadonságának, ez volt az egész tervezett utunk legfobb célja. De ezt az utazást majd a következo beszámolóban írom le (hamarosan).


Az útvonalunk a következo Google Map-on látható:
http://g.co/maps/wcwv8
(A Bowen utáni szakaszokhoz le kell menni a jobboldali panel aljára, és a következo oldalakra kattintani!!)