Monday, 2 August 2010

Coloured Sands




From our park at Endeavour Falls we have been to a number of places. The caravan is only 100 metres from Endeavour Falls which we visited shortly after our arrival. We also drove to Isabella Falls which are quite impressive, especially when you get to drive through water which Ian really enjoyed. Whilst we were waiting to cross the water to see the falls there was another Prado stopped in the middle of the water with its owner giving it a wash! They had been to the Coloured Sands and were just washing off the sand and salt. Cheap carwash!
Saturday and we drove into the Hope Vale Aboriginal Community to travel to the Coloured Sands. Firstly you have to gain a permit from the store which we discovered wasn’t open when we got there at 10.30. Fortunately the morning service had just finished at the Lutheran Church and we were able to ask where we should obtain the permit. We were advised to travel down to the Coloured Sands and stop at the big mango tree and see Eddie who is the T.O. (Traditional Owner) and he would give us a permit. Meanwhile another car had been circling the town looking for the same thing so we met Rebecca, Sam and Brayden and decided to travel together which made Suey very happy as the roads were not really great (they weren’t really bad by any measure) and courageous is not in her 4WD vocabulary!
So off we went in convoy to find Eddie at the big mango tree! Big is an understatement! When we found Eddie after a couple of wrong turns and some creative driving the tree was so big you almost didn’t see it except for the fact that Eddie’s whole house appears to be built around it like a giant tree house on the ground. Eddie was very obliging and we paid our ten dollars per car to travel through his traditional land. Rebecca asked about the crocodiles and Eddie said they didn’t bother him especially since he shot a big one, bled it out and trailed the blood along the front of the camp. It seems the crocodiles don’t come around so much.
We enquired from a few other travellers about the tide before we ventured along the beach and having decided we were unlikely to float away, drove onto the beach. The sands are beautifully diverse in colour and quite impressive, but the wind defeated our plans to stay long and we were all sandblasted very effectively. However some good photos have come out of the day.
Rebecca, Sam and Brayden drove back with us and later called at our camp to have a look at the falls. Sue gave Rebecca our details in case they were travelling through on their way back to Tasmania and we both thought the other has obtained their details, so if Rebecca or Sam (or probably even Brayden who is a very clever two year old!) should check our blog, please leave your contact details as we would love to see you when we go down to Tasmania.

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