Fri, 29th July, 2022 Bush camp at Quondong Beach to Gumbanan Wilderness Retreat, Dampier Peninsula, WA (Beagle Bay church & King Sound)

6.30am 14 degrees with the camper closed up and the easterly wind blowing hard outside but the sky is clear and the sea appears flat though I haven’t walked down to it to see how high the swells might be. Steve’s father, Terry, always made me walk down and put my feet in the water at Woodgate before I could come and wake him up to go whiting fishing, as from up on the dune it looks calm but down at the water’s edge you could see how big the swells were! Learnt that lesson well.

Packed up and said farewell to Cheryl and Gary. They are heading east now but hopefully we will run into them again somewhere on the road when they come back to south WA next year.

Back out to the Cape Leveque Road or on my other map the Beagle Bay Road and headed north. Lots of roadworks happening as a big section of the road was eaten away by the heavy rains and obviously more sections suffered too.

Turned off to Beagle Bay Community - it is no where near the ‘bay’ itself. Reasonably neat and clean but still a lot of damaged cars and houses about. Heaps of signs about looking after the area and keeping drugs out so some members are trying to improve things for others.

Found the Sacred Heart Church which I had read about in Di Morrissey’s book Tears of the Moon and had put it on my list of things I had to see. Read all the information - amazing feat for the period of time when it was built.

Made our donation and went inside. No one else about which was nice. The pearl shell etc makes a beautiful display.

A couple of the 14 Stations of the Cross paintings.

Walked to the other end which is the main entrance with the bell tower above. You could look up to it and the bell pull was just hanging there. Back into the church you can look at the side of the bell through a square opening.

Looking back down to the altar.

Truly a beautiful achievement and so wonderful it is still being carefully looked after and cherished.

Outside - the school is next to it.

Back to the main road and continued north. Long straight roads with lots of yellow blossoms on the trees making the scrub a pretty sight.

Lunch at Djarindjin Roadhouse - nice mural.

The roadhouse is near the entrance to Lombadin Community. They charge $10 per person to go into the community and for access to the beach. There is another old church there that was lined with paperbark and a bakery that was famous for its bread but we decided it wasn’t worth another $20 to just look. In front of the road house you can book a tag-a-long tour to go to Cape Leveque as the road is closed to the public now as the Kooljaman Resort that was there and run by two families of this area is now closed down due to a dispute between the families. It is falling apart now, just like what happened to Cape York Wilderness Lodge after it was handed back to the ‘locals’.

As we continued along the bitumen we found that the road was definitely block to Cape Leveque.

Continued onto One Arm Point Road and headed east. Passed the turn off into Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm, they have tours etc and also boat rides out to a reef to watch the waterfalls off it as the tide recedes. As we had done this on the cruise at Montgomery Reef we skipped going in there.

Turned off onto a sandy track into Gambanan, on one sign or Gumbanan Wilderness Resort on another. On the Hema it is spelt Gunbarnun! Any way it is run by the Davey family and open for visitors to camp in bush setting by King Sound waters.

Met the caretakers who said to just choose a spot and come and pay at the cafe (which is a food van) later on. All the campgrounds are the same price up here $20 per person per night unpowered with very basic facilities - not that we use any facilities as we are fully self-contained.

Walked around checking out where to park up. The tide is just turning from high tide so you can see the swirl of the water as it rushes out. We are near the top of King Sound which goes down to Derby and has the very high tides. It has dropped a bit since I first took a photo.

Chose our spot and set up with a nice view of the water. No wind here.

Put on our togs and went for the 1km walk along to Squeaky Beach as it was just coming off high tide. The sand wasn’t squeaky but it was a nice little spot to get wet though I was keeping a good lookout for crocs as we are beside mangroves but it was all good. Forgot to take a photo of Steve but he did get in for a dip too.

Walked back and had a cuppa and relaxed listening to and watching the corellas who were very busy digging in the dirt for something.

Walked back to east side to watch the tide - using the white rock as my reference point.

The tide is rushing out and more rocks are appearing out near the islands.

Steve pointed out a building which is at the end of One Arm Point (Wikicamps comment said it was named that after a fisherman that blasted his arm off with dynamite). The building looks like part of the shell hatchery at the point from the photo in the tourist booklet. Beside that are islands and north is the Indian Ocean.

Below the camp area is an old fish trap made by the local family. The caretaker said it has been used by 6 generations of this family.

There is good internet here so I was able to do some uploading etc. 

Another check of the fish trap and the white rock as the tide continues to go out.

Great colour as the sun sets over the mangroves. Half the corellas flew off to their spot for the night.

Hardly any water left in the fish trap now and more islands are appearing.

The air chilled as the darkness arrived.

We decided to have a treat from the food van - Barra and chips though not fresh barra but the chips were excellent and Steve is very fussy about his chips. Finished off the icecream too.