Page 5 - Camper Trailer Magazine Along the Savannah Way

Find your way with Hema’s maps.
TraVeL
Top end all the way across
Left to right: Upper Mitchell Falls, WA; Lake Argyle, WA; Linda’s and Steven’s Jayco Swan.
camper trailers are permitted. We left our Jayco in Kununurra and stayed at one of the Purnululu safari camps.
Along the Gibb River Road, there is one amazing highlight after the other. Emma Gorge on El Questro Station offers a must-do walk up to the gorge (but no camping). At the El Questro township, there is camping along with 4WDriving, bushwalking into dramatic gorges, a Chamberlain River cruise and soaking in the warm waters of Zebedee Springs. Delightful Happy Valley Station has camping down by the Pentecost River with sunsets over the Cockburn Range. Drysdale River Station offers camping at Miners Pool beside the
Drysdale River. We left our camper trailer at the station campground as it was not up to the 4WD track to the Mitchell Plateau; those with a true offroad setup can camp at the Munurru Campground by the King Edward River or at the Punamii-Unpun Campground at Mitchell River NP. Instead, we treated ourselves to a couple of nights at the Ungolan Wilderness Camp and drove into the park twice for a never-to-be-forgotten walk along the Mitchell River to Mitchell Falls, and then an always-to-remember helicopter flight over the falls and along the Kimberley coastline.
But that’s not all. There was Mount Elizabeth Station where we broke a spring and had to rig it back together with a spare u-bolt. Barnett River Gorge had a most pleasant campground with safe swimming and a walk to the gorge. Galvans Gorge was a lovely little stop as was Adcock Gorge. Tragically, our gerry-rigged spring didn’t allow us to take the 185 4WD-track to Mornington
Wilderness Camp (with Simplicity Suspension we could have) and we still haven’t recovered from missing that spot. The mechanic at
the Imintji Roadhouse found a spare part to fix our spring with, and that allowed us to visit Bell Gorge followed by Windjana Gorge NP. We spent several happy days there, photographing a congregation of about 100 freshwater crocodiles while camped at the base of a 350-million-year-old Devonian- period coral reef cliff. A day trip to nearby Tunnel Creek NP completed that side tour, which can also be done from the Northern Highway.
Broome pins the western end of the Savannah Way. We are heading up there again in a few months with a new Topaz offroad caravan that should take us anywhere we want to go. Still, for the fun and money, we’ll never forget our first Savannah journey in our camper trailer, a trip that anyone can take with a bit of care and caution. n
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