Cruising Along The Gibb

22 nd July

We said goodbye to El Questro this morning after Paul cooked us a breakfast of pancakes ( a way to use less bread as we are down to 2 loaves for the next five days).

We turned onto the Gibb River Rd pleasantly surprised by the condition of the road ( I am thinking the grader has been through fairly recently). We got to the legendary Pentecost River quite quickly and Paul, after stressing about it for months, drove through it like he had been doing it all his life.

It was a long drive today but one thing that did amaze us was the way the colour of the road changed. It went from a dusty grey to a beautiful red. I know it sounds bizarre to say the colour of a road was beautiful but it really was something to see.

Maree in her quest to see as many gorges along the road as possible suggested we go to Mount Barnett gorge because it was only 2 km off the main road. It seemed like such a good idea at the time until we felt like we were driving in circles through the spinifex towing the camper trailers. Eventually we got to the end of the track and wait for it, it was a rocky one hour walk! I had a complete revolt from my four who point blank refused to do it - the fact that it was 2 pm and they hadn't had lunch may have had something to do with it. After speaking to a few people who had just finished we decided to have a picnic lunch by the sandy creek and then head on to Mt Barnett roadhouse, our stop for this evening.

The three families are setup in a semi circle and we all decided to stay hitched as it is only a one night stay. As soon as we finished setting up we sent all the kids in search of firewood - a blissful 10 mins. Now we will have to follow through with the promise of toasted marshmallows again.