We were raided by bandits last night! Iain was up a few
times during the night to move things they were trying to get into. Every time
he got down the ladder and walked to the side of the car, I would hear the
patter of little feet running around the other side. In the morning we gathered
the evidence.
And it all pointed to these little critters – Bandicoots!
By 6.30 the sun was well up as were we, the trek to Mitchell
Falls is a pretty long hot one, so best done early. By 7.30 we were already
walking. It was only 800m to the first swimming hole. We stopped for a look,
but it wasn’t hot enough for a swim yet. The next part of the walk was 3.5km,
ranging from sandy track to climbing rocks. We came to a caution cliff sign and
there in front of us we were looking down into a massive gorge.
We thought at first we had come to the falls and were a
little disappointed that there was no water – we remembered Pieter and Susanna
saying the same, and realised we had to carry on. We walked about another km
and came across another gorge, and a swimming hole and knew we were getting
close.
The scenery was just getting better and better, we found the helipad and
met another couple that pointed us in the right direction. As we rounded the
corner we saw the falls side on.
Now this is where you benefit from talking to people, this
was the end of the official trail, but if you walked a little further around
the rocks and did a bit of climbing you can see the falls front on. We were
told the trail was hard to find, we eventually found a way around – absolutely
terrifying. We climbed big rocks, through gaps in rocks and at one stage had to
leopard crawl under a ledge with an enormous drop off to the side. We made it!
For the first time in my life I actually saw Iain afraid of heights, it was so
scary but well worth the effort. We sat on the rocks taking pictures and
enjoying the view for about an hour.
Luckily going back we found the trail, which was a little
easier than our way and made our way back to the helipad. It was by now blazing
hot and the rocks had started to warm up and reflect heat. We got to the first
swimming hole and went in with all our clothes – this is a great tip, keeps you
cool while you are walking – for about 10 mins and then they are dry again.
We then started the long hot trek back to camp, we now
realised why people pay to get the helicopter back to camp, unfortunately we
hadn’t organised it so were stuck with walking. We stopped a few times along
the way to take photos; Iain was able to reach into some of the water holes
with his hat t get water to cool us down. By the time we got to the last water
hole we couldn’t get our shoes off quick enough, unfortunately it was very
shallow and muddy, so we just sat in the flowing water and cooled off.
By the time we got back to camp we were exhausted, we spent
the rest of the day lying in the shade, alternately reading and sleeping.
Iain
made up a batch of henna and in the evening after having a bush shower, he
practiced some of his henna art on me.
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