With two nights allocated to explore Lake Argyle itself, we hit the ground running. After checking in to the Lake Argyle Caravan Park (and possibly being allocated the only two sites in the park with no shade) we drove a short distance to visit the Argyle Homestead Museum, housed in the original Durack Homestead.
You can’t visit the Kimberley without hearing mention of the pioneering Durack family, originally from Galway, Ireland.
Between 1883–85, they undertook one of the longest cattle drives in history, travelling from western Queensland with the aim of establishing a pastoral industry along the fertile Ord River.
The family enterprise would eventually comprise five stations at it’s peak, encompassing an area the size of Belgium!
“When the Ord River Dam was completed, in early 1971, Lake Argyle began to fill more rapidly than anyone anticipated. The Homestead was dismantled stone by stone, stored in Kununurra, and rebuilt towards the end of the decade, 15km from its original position. In 1979 the building was opened as a museum, dedicated to the pioneering spirit of the Durack family.” ( https://argylehomesteadmuseum.com.au/)
We were lucky enough to arrive when wonderful caretakers Rod and Lyndal were looking after the museum and we enjoyed hearing the story of the Durack family and looking around the building with its fascinating photos and artefacts as well as meeting the local bower bird and his charming abode which included an eclectic collection of white pebbles, glass and plastic all aimed at impressing the future Mrs. Bower 😉
We drove down to view the dam wall from a lookout and peered over the edge to see where our sunset cruise would depart from later that day.
The sunset cruise came highly recommended by Steph and John who had done it before and the afternoon sun was at its warmest when we set off so hats were the order of the day. On the water we were amazed again at the vastness of this lake, this ‘inland sea,’ but were glad we had had the chance to view it from the air earlier as you really couldn’t conceptualise the size of it from the boat.
We cruised amongst islands, viewed some of the ‘freshies’ sunning themselves on the shore – including this fellow with part of his lower jaw missing – and spotted wildlife and birds.
As the sun began to go down we stopped for the much anticipated sunset drinks and swim. The water was glorious and a large number of us took advantage of the champagne or beer on offer to cap off what was an amazing experience….
whilst others bravely looked on…… 😜
There was singing on the way home which some participated in with more enthusiasm than others but we all agreed it had been a wonderful experience!
The next morning I was off to the much photographed infinity pool in the caravan park at opening time trying to beat the hoards of Instagrammers but still had to wait my turn for the iconic shot 😎
The caravan park has recently changed ownership and apparently there are big plans underway for its updating which we all agreed is much needed. Hopefully we will get to see the changes one day in the future.
For now though we continue to push east and tomorrow will cross the border and enter the Northern Territory.