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Today was the first full day -
Last night Diggor felt ill and abandoned the tent we were staying in, for the extra bed in caravan with the others. This was perfect for me as I spread out and went straight to sleep.
This morning I woke up last, at 7:30am, just as the others were making breakfast and tea etc. Unfortunately, as predicted, the weather broke, and we had consistent drizzle all last night. When I got out the tent everywhere was soaked.
We also discovered bad news - the crack in the windscreen on the car, caused by a stone form a passing car on the gravel track, had got significantly bigger. Mark is in process of finding out what to do, but doesn't want to drive it too far of possible unless if spreads across the whole screen.
We messed around, sorting camp, having breakfast and getting changed etc, hoping the rain would stop and we could go off exploring. By 12 when everyone had stopped faffing and had finished late breakfast etc it was still drizzle/raining, but we decided we would go off on a walk anyway.
We drove 8km down the road to the visitor centre, where all the trails begin, and picked a route having spoken to the rangers in there.
The scenery along the walk was absolutely incredible - I have all the photos on my camera. The main river basin created as part of carving the gorge out the rock is amazing, it's just full of huge boulders brought by the floods. Then at the top of the banks thick forest grows up to the bottom of the cliffs of the gorge.
The main 'attractions' we went to see were the 'art gallery' where all the aboriginal paintings are on a rock face and the 'Ampitherre'. For me the 'Ampitherre' was the most amazing spectacle - you walk through a narrow crack in the huge cliffs and just step out into a bowl in the rock where the vertical walls just go straight up to the sky above, and the only way in and out is the crack in the cliff you walk through.
The total route was about 11km and by the time we got back it was about 5pm and everyone was shattered. There was continuous drizzle ALL day, which made it seem like harder work than usually it would have done. It didn't damped our spirits though, we all still had a great time.
When we got back and showered etc we just sat round discussing the day under the marque, then went off and make baked spuds and beef casserole for dinner in the big outdoor cooking/eating area.
By the time we had finished eating I was exhausted again, so I got into my tent and went to sleep to the sound of the rain on the marque, which we moved above tent to stop it getting too wet in case it started to let water in.
Photo - (all the good photos are on my camera, so I'm just putting any old photos on here to let me post the blog)
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