Blogs from Lake Argyle, Western Australia, Australia, Oceania

The Lake Argle Caravan Park is nestled amid the Carr Boyd Ranges over looking Bamboo Cove, south east of Kununurra. Lake Argyle has a surface area of 1000square kilometres and a shore line that stretches over 900 kms. Home to an estimated 30,000 freshwater crocodile, 26 species of native fish and 3 varieties of fresh water turtle. The Irish Durack family who first settled in Dixon Creek, Queensland investigated the land along the Ord River and in June 1883 set out from Dixons Creek with 7520 head of cattle. 3000 miles to the Ord River, arriving 2 years later with less than 1/2 the cattle they started with. The New cattle station called 'Argyle' was 2,500,000 acres. In the 1950's because of the lack of cattle sales the Durack Family sold up. In 1972 the Argyle ... read more

A wounded car makes for a bit of sadness (especially on the weekend) so I looked out for something to do to keep our mind off the mechanical woes until Monday. The Kimberley Cat Mothers Day Cruise was advertised at the supermarket and we booked it immediately. David the bus driver, comes from Tassie and drives six months here in the Kimberley and six months back in Tassie. He's friendly and full of information as we pick up the people from all of the motels and caravan parks before we head out to Lake Argyle. We stop at the Durack Homestead for a short while to get photos and look at the stone homestead which was moved from its original site (now at the bottom of Lake Argyle). Then it's on to the lake itself where ... read more

Because we had missed out on on the Victoria River cruise (and as a consequence travelled further), our destination (Kununurra and Lake Argyle) was a lot closer. We had some spare time up our sleeve and so when we saw the Zebra Rock Mine sign, the decision was easy. I had heard about this particular rock (and it turns out that this is the only operating Zebra Rock mine in the world!) so we felt quite privileged to be able to tour. We were greeted by Ruth and her very cute daughter Opal. Ruth and her husband Kim Duncan operate the Zebra Rock Mine and have built this business from nothing in six years. A truly remarkable achievement! Ruth is very knowlegeable and I have a guided tour of the different rocks that they have on ... read more

We got a late start so we spent the night at Willare Bridge Roadhouse, which, as roadhouses go, was pretty cozy. Their facilities were nice enough, it had a bit of a station feel, it only cost 22 bucks and the next morning we both got free coffee! Not bad at all :) We decided to drive as far as possible in order to save as many nights as possible for potentially open national parks (though we could only find out if they were open when we got to the closest town for updated information), so we went over 500 km to Halls Creek, where it was unexpectedly equal parts cold and depressing. And that night we learned the hard way what a little lack of information can do. We were getting ready to go to ... read more

Photos from our cruise on Lake Argyle... read more