Day 50, Year 3: Day Trip to Nhulunbuy and Yirrkala
Date: Saturday, June 28, 2008
Weather: Beautiful Day; Winds SE 15-20
Location: Gove Harbor, Northern Territory, Australia
We are now on Darwin time which is 30 minutes behind Queensland. We knew this but did not set the clocks, so we missed the weather this morning and got up just in time for the radio nets. We have been checking in on the Sheila Net, but today was our last day for that. We will now only listen to and check in on the Darwin Net which will now be at 8 am. So this morning right after the Darwin Net, we headed to shore to figure out how to get to town. Other cruisers had booked a taxi van, but we didn’t have a large enough group to do this. So on the recommendation of cruisers who have been here before, we walked to the main road and hitched a ride to town. Our ride was a young man who has lived here and worked in the mine for the past eight years. He had his one year old daughter, Finlae, with him, and he was a wealth of information. When we arrived in Nhulunbuy we were quite surprised. It was way more town than we expected. Obviously the mine subsidizes much of the growth here.
Once in town, we decided to take a taxi to the next town, Yirrkala, which is an aboriginal settlement. We went to the Buku Larrnggay Mulka Art Centre and Museum and really enjoyed the aboriginal art. We found some young boys playing the diggeredoo. We then met a couple of young girls who tried to introduce themselves. But they spoke no English and we don’t speak their language, so we communicated with hand gestures. We took some pictures of them and then we went in to watch a video explaining some of the aboriginal traditions. One of the little girls came in and sat on my lap for the longest time. I think she was fascinated by my hair which was pulled back in a pony tail. She sat and stroked my hair and then finally went on her way.
We made our way back to Nhulunbuy by taxi, did some food shopping, and then took another taxi back to the yacht club. We went back to Windbird and spent some time planning our next jaunt and then joined other cruisers for Happy Hour at the club. We grilled fish for dinner and continued enjoying the company of other cruisers as we all planned for our next move. Many are moving on tomorrow to go through the Gugari Rip, better known as “The Hole in the Wall.” This is a pass that gets us through the islands separating us from the next huge bay we have to cross. The “hole” has quite a current and has to be transited at just the right time. We will go half way to the “hole” tomorrow and then transit it the next day. By Tuesday, we will be on the other side and working our way to Darwin, one day at a time.
 |
| 080628 Day 50 Nhulunbuy and Irrkala |
