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(Editor's Note: We are grateful that Perry Taylor has submitted his latest adventure for all of us to drool over.    Perry uses the versatility of the Seawind like no one else on the planet.    Thank you again Perry for sharing with us!   Of course we will gladly publish any Seawind adventures submitted.)

Kimberly trip AUGUST 2005,  Seawind VH-VIV
Possible mission winter 2006, lots of seaplanes or Caravan?
Recommendations: April best month due to still green, but can be windy:
May, June, July, August best months, “cooler”, July busy rooms may be hard to get, August good, but dry.
Following is 10 elapsed days, every box ticked, only “need” 1 day at Kununurra, 1 at Broome.

Perry and Viv scoped out all possibilities, BUT distances are BIG, avgas is available but “slow”, as in the unfriendly west, service is lacking, if they run out, u never know until u arrive, even if u fone ahead.
So, for interest here is our Flite log, times are flite times from 60 knots to 60 knots, lots of low flying and looking around, lots of water landings, lots of climbing very high on long legs to clear heat, turbulence and headwinds.

Monday Departed Noosa - Emerald - Mt. Isa – Camooweal, overnite at shitty Roadhouse.

Camooweal airport about to take off for Kununurra            The deliteful town of Camooweal, notice lush vegetation

Tuesday: Departed Camooweal 0930 – Tennant Creek refuel – via the Tanami desert road at 1000’ due tailwinds at this level and strong headwinds above, but below radio contact height and would not want to land anywhere out there with all the camels, to Lake Kununurra…. We splashed down in the lake and taxied to the flashy sounding Kona holiday village, where “Lake Front Villa’s look out over the ………”, all we saw was 350 shirt tuggers crowding the tire banked shore all begging for us to tie up at their tree or cabin and beat us to death with stupid questions, from the bored silver tops, the look on their collective faces as we turned from shore and blasted them with full power and a 200’ flume of prop washed water as we took off and headed for rhe security fenced safety of Kununurra Airport less than 1 km away, so booked in at Mercure Inn, $150 p nite, shuttle to airport 5 mins, and “enjoyed” shitty meal at Star of Kimberleys restaurant, Barramundi should ONLY be BBQ’d and the pretentious priks did not have XXXX Gold, only place apart from shitty Croc pub at Kakadu. Viv did not even wait for prop to stop to get to Pink Diamond shop….

Islands in Lk Argyle, fantastic seaplane heaven.         Argyle Pink Diamond mine.                

Wednesday: Kununurra day trip via Wyndham coastal, Berkeley River, lovely gorges and river, round to King Georges River and the famous falls that were not flowing due a 3 year “Dry” wet, we landed in the river and taxied around, running into True North at the “falls”, no use stopping as too many Crocs to get out of the Seawind, so, off to Faraway Bay, to see Bruce and Robyn.

Was blowing about 20kts and 2’ chop, so we elected to buzz Bruce twice and overfly for the Crocodile research station around the next headland. We zoomed up the river at about 50’, finally located the “research” station, it looked like an abo (aboriginie, ed.) camp, it was BLOODY hot at over 35C (95F) so we climbed high for flite back to Lake Kununurra, which runs parallel to the runway at Kununurra and only 1 km south, so we splashed down there and threw the Seawind around a bit to wash it off and we cooled down, then took off for the 30 sec flite to the runway.

King George River and Falls with True North

Thursday: Off to the Bungle Bungles, via the Argyle Diamond Mine. Picnic lunch on Lake Argyle, feeding the sea eagles and watching for harmless freshwater crocs, while we waited for the sun to drop before a quick flite to Drysdale River Station, our hopping off and avgas point for the Bonaparte Archipelago.

The Kimberley	Drysdale River Station is a working property, travellers can stay in   containers converted to rooms, good food and bar.

Friday: Depart Drysdale for Vansittart Bay, home to a crashed DC-3 which perished in 1947 after an american captain got lost trying to find Broome to evacuate due to cyclone, now Pasppaley Pearls harvest the bay using mother ships and crew that are rotated week on / week off, to Darwin using their fleet of Grumman Mallard flying boats. We flew mesmorised by bay after bay, rivers, beautiful beaches, totally untouched and guarded by the territorial estuarine crocodile, waiting for high tide to land at the Kimberly Coastal Camp (www.kimberleycoastalcamp.com.au) . Today had a 7.5 meter tide, average for here, so we arrived at exactly 10:16.  Rocky has built a fantastic bush camp, only access is by seaplane or helicopter, no road access at all, and by boat it's too far.

Bay in front of Kimberley Coastal Camp                          The Camp, lots of tin, GREAT Scones

After some freshly baked scones, yes they rose beautifully, we were off to Mitchell River falls, but falls had stopped due to long dry. We decided to keep touring just “free” flying along coast down gorges, rivers, destination eventually to be Cascade Falls. After flying low down a beautiful river as we came around a corner, we saw a fantastic “ship” with Helicopter on top, so we buzzed the boat. Very soon we were radioed by the boat to come back for lunch.

We turned around, landed and the crew tied us up to the diving deck, Dick Smith welcomed us aboard, quick tour of the boat and one of the crew knew us, Perry had trained Steve how to fly the BAe 146 Jet, in old Ansett days. Lovely lasagne lunch but we rejected the offer to stay aboard for a few nites; who needs a boat when u got a plane. Dick suggested that we stay at Taffy and Annabelle’s, Mt Hart homestead instead of back to Drysdale, what a treat! Quick swim in the lagoon, few XXXX Gold’s wonderful dinner, quiet clean rooms, ready for more adventure.

The Ulysees Blue in Hunter River, Bonaparte Archapeligo, nice lasagne Dick!

Saturday: What a find at Mt Hart.  Annabelle and Taffy run a wonderful homestead, great food and ambience.   We reluctantly departed after refueling the Seawind for Collier Bay, the World's Second Largest Tidal Range (13 meters), Horizontal falls (www.horizontalfalls.com.au) , Cockatoo Island, Sunday Islands, Cape Leveque, Willie Creek to Broome.

Viv did not wait for prop to stop to get to Pearl shops……. We arrived in Broome for Stairway to Moon festival, so off to the Mangrove to view the “spectacle” and off to Matso’s for dinner, should have known when there was no XXXX Gold, meal and service very substandard.

Horizontal falls, we took about 50 fotos, from water level to 2000’, nothing captures this spectacle as good as the EYE

Sunday: . Day off at Cable Beach Club got us for another day, but staff attitude drove nearly all the guests out, so, luckily we found the Zoo Café, just opposite Cable Beach Club (McAlpine would be so pissed off!), good coffee, service and great meals, no attitude and YES, XXXX Gold…….


Monday: Departed Broome to go back to Cascade Falls, then back down to Mt. Hart Homestead, great to get out of the big city. Taffy had organised a cheese platter and Champagne and XXXX Gold for us to take to the springs at the Gorge which we found after a ruff drive in his Toyota and a 30 minute stroll to a beautiful pool to cool off and watch another Western Australian sunset.

Secret champagne pool at Mt Hart                          Wolf Creek meteorite crater, in Tanami desert

Cascade falls, where Ginger Meadows was taken 10 yrs ago by a croc.

Tuesday: Left Taffy and Annabelle at the Mt. Hart Homestead to fly across the Great Stony Desert and the Tanami Deserts to Halls Creek, then Kakadu.

    

Escarpment at Kakadu                                          Crocodile Hotel, Kakadu, boring

Wednesday: Kakadu was “disappointing” after the spectacular Kimberley, but we had time to fly 300 miles off track for a quick diversion. Flew direct Karumba along southern shore of Gulf of Carpentaria, over Roper River, Sweers Island. Refuelled at Karumba and made Mareeba by dark in very strong S/E headwinds.

Karumba, home of the “morning glory” spectacular sunsets and Seaplane base in the 1940’s

Thursday: Rain and strong winds greeted us Mareeba, so we postponed our Barrier Reef water landings for a few weeks, ran for home, albeit slowly, 35 – 40 Kt headwinds, via Rocky, Bundy, Noosa..