Gibb River Road (Manning Gorge / Galvans Gorge) (28-30 Jun)

As one of the last people to arrive at Manning Gorge, the camp ground was heaving due to the school holidays. We managed to find a site at the far end of the caravan park some 5-minute walk from the park’s only ablution block. With only three permanent cubicles for each gender, Justin reported that queues formed from as early as 5:30am and that a cubicle with a missing door (which directly faced the toilet block’s entrance) did not deter a fellow camper from using it for number twos. Desperate times call for desperate measures

Early the next morning, Justin bumped into Adam and Guy (whom we last saw in Broome) again as they prepared to set-off for Manning Gorge. We followed shortly afterwards at 7:30am to beat the crowds. The walk commenced with a river crossing where we were provided with blue plastic barrels, split lengthways, to ferry our belongings. We continued our hike in damp bathers to the gorge pool where we enjoyed a swim until Justin and Millie decided to scale the rocks to join Adam and Guy at the top of the waterfall.

I waited what seemed like forever for their return and surmised that Justin must be enjoying the company of adults who were not his wife. It transpired that Adam and Guy were patiently picking-off hundreds of wriggling worms (or leeches) attached to Justin after he sat in shallow, flowing waters at the top of the waterfall. Adam graciously lent Justin a spare pair of bathers which were returned after being washed in boiling water with a good dose of Dettol. Thankfully, Millie was largely spared as she was sitting on Justin’s lap and not directly in the water at the time.

After the morning’s drama, we decided to knock-off Galvans Gorge in the same afternoon as the walk was an easy stroll from the car park. The swimming hole was pretty but Millie refused to get into the water as she has an aversion to mud and vegetation growing around the pool’s entrance. Being Millie’s turn to sleep with me that evening, she could not contain her excitement and kept asking me to guess what she and Justin had ordered for my birthday. Each of my responses was met with a coy, “Maybe or maybe not!” As I attempted to nod-off for the nth time, Millie unwittingly blurted, “Mum, ask me about the mug we got you for your birthday!”.