Giant Green Monster in our Bathroom

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Today we fly back to Kununurra and from there on to El Questro in the East Kimberley.

We’ve got some time to kill so we visit Broome’s Japanese and Chinese cemeteries. These were originally deliberately located outside the town boundary, probably for some obscure reason related to our racist past. Thankfully the town boundary was subsequently moved, so they’re now well inside. The Chinese section is a bit underwhelming and not particularly well maintained. I wonder if Premier Xi knows about this. If not I’m sure he soon will, which will undoubtedly result in yet another mark against us Aussies in his now probably not so little black book. The Japanese area is certainly more attractive, and there’s also a bit more information on its history. The first burial here was way back in the 1890s, and a lot of the graves are of the early Pearl divers, many of whom died from drowning, the bends, and other diving related causes. More than 900 Japanese are buried here, which is apparently thought to make it the largest Japanese cemetery outside Japan. Many of the older headstones are made of distinctive local sandstone. They’ve all been immaculately carved with what we read are the deceased’s name, place of birth and date of death.

The attendant on our flight to Kununurra is the same poor young Filipino gent who was on our last flight. We remember him mainly because he got stage fright and forgot the words to the introduction. He then got so embarrassed that he had to cover his face with the safety card whilst explaining the finer points of life jackets, and as soon as he'd finished he made a dive for the toilet. No problem this time however. He’s handed the reins to his Aussie mate, who it seems is taking no chances; he's reading his lines from a sheet of paper.

We're collected from the airport for our hour long drive to El Questro by Glenn, an expat South African. He tells us that he’s been in Australia for nearly thirty years. He says he worked in the telecommunications industry in Adelaide before doing a complete career flip four years ago and coming up here with his wife. He expected to be making beds but they told him they wanted him to be a tour guide. We assume he must have done a lot of training, but he says all they did before letting him loose on the tourists was give him a few brochures to read. We can both read; maybe we could become tour guides up here.

We're told that the original million acre pastoral lease on which El Questro now stands was first established back in 1903, and it's changed hands many times since. I've always been curious as to what El Questro means. I’m fairly sure from six long years of trying to learn Spanish that "el" means "the", but "Questro"s a new one on me. It seems that it’s a new one on everyone. The name was apparently bestowed by a previous owner back in 1958, but "Questro" doesn't mean anything in Spanish and the gent who named it has taken the mystery of the source of the name to his grave. Will and Celia Burrell took over the lease in 1991. They converted it to both pastoral and tourism use, and handed three hundred thousand of the original million acres back to the local indigenous people. The remaining seven hundred thousand remain an active cattle station, but only 6,000 head of cattle are run on it, which is a much lower stocking rate than on other stations in the region, in recognition of the tourism aspect.

Accommodation is available at three locations across the station - "The Homestead" provides super-luxury facilities overlooking the Chamberlain River; you can camp or stay in a cabin at "The Station"; or you can lay your head down in a glamping tent at "Emma Gorge". We've chosen the latter. Our tent is in the shadows of the characteristic red and orange peaks and cliffs of the Cockburn Range, which look spectacular in the late afternoon sun.

Issy goes to clean her teeth in the bathroom at the back of the tent, and comments on the pretty statue of a giant bright green frog sitting next to the sink. She goes to pick it up. Uh oh. It seems it's not a statue, and it starts hopping all over the bathroom. A few long and frantic minutes later she manages to trap it under one of her hats and throw it outside. I usually read the bad reviews of places we're planning on staying at before we book them, and I now remember reading about a woman who claimed her tent was overrun with frogs, and nothing she did seemed to be able to keep them out. In the end it all got too much for her and she packed up and left. None of the other reviews seemed to mention anything similar. Maybe we‘ve just happened to get the frog tent; we are right next to a creek. I’d assumed the frogs were tiny, not the giant green monster that was leaping around our bathroom a few minutes ago. Issy says that frogs don’t bite, but Mr Google seems to disagree. I think I can feel a sleepless night coming on.

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Comments

[Dancing Dave]

El Questro sunset
We are booked for a Kimberleys adventure in June 2023. Hope the Western Australian border is open to us New South Welshmen by then...doesn't it apply to Victorians? Also hope the rivers, waterholes and waterfalls are still brimming then...2022 with El Nina (another Spanish word) they should be overflowing. Looking for your exploits and hope you have plenty of photos to warm the cockles. Enjoy the Kimberleys won't you?

[DaveandIssy]

Kimberley
You will love it! Issy thinks it was the best trip we've ever taken. We were really lucky to get there. When we left home the WA premier was only letting in people from States that hadn't had a case in the previous 14 days. We figured this was less likely in the NT, so we left home a bit earlier than originally planned to make sure that we were in the Territory for at least 14 days before we went to WA, which was why we were able to get in. Doubly lucky was that NT closed its borders to Victorians only a matter of hours after we landed in Darwin. Hopefully this is all now behind us!