Murujuga National Park

On Sunday we got up early for a two-hour tour at Murujuga (Burrup Peninsula) National Park to see the petroglyphs (rock art). This was my main reason for going to Karratha.

A few years ago I’d been to a conference where an archeologist for one of the mining companies talked about the rock art there and how much there was, how old it was, and how it was just getting blown up. Thankfully, there’s still some left, but listening to the Aboriginal tour guide, it’s clear the area is not as highly valued as it should be.

Nevertheless, we had a great tour and enjoyed spotting the various petroglyphs in a landscape that looked like it had already been mined with all the waste dumped behind rather than it being the result of a natural process. Fascinating place to visit.

Red Dog of Dampier

After the petroglyphs we made a quick stop to see the statue of Red Dog at the entrance to Dampier. If you haven’t seen the movie, do yourself a favour and check it out. Though be prepared for tears. I couldn’t but think of my grandmother when we were there; she loved that movie.

We had our photos taken and I’m squinting in every one because of the sun in my eyes.

Old Pilbara Towns

The second half of the day was spent visiting small regional towns. First, Point Samson for lunch and then a swim (but the water isn’t very deep so I ended up only in water up to just over my knees and couldn’t be bothered getting all the way wet. Definitely not as pretty as Python Pool).

Next was Cossack, a town built on the estuary in the 1800s that used to be a port and take a lot of the ships, including the pearl fishing boats. Terrible history (look up “black-birding”) and in my opinion the interpretation in the old court house was a white wash.

We looked through a few of the remaining buildings, had a scone, then set off for Roebourne to check out the Aboriginal art gallery there (formally an old colonial building), and see some of the other old buildings in the town.

Lots of old stuff (though really, after seeing petroglyphs that are tens of thousands of years old, they weren’t old at all) then back to the hotel for a bit of a rest.

In the evening we went for bowls and burgers at the Dampier Bowling Club and had a fun evening (apart from being made to feel like the influx of 100 additional customers was more than a slight inconvenience). Besides that we had fun and got back to the hotel at 11 with a small group of us setting off for late-night Maccas (but it was closed due to maintenance even though it’s 24-hours). We ended up at BP instead and had ice creams then went off to bed.

Monday was a fairly chill day. We explored the Red Earth Arts Precinct; great building, just a surprise that it’s all the way out there in a town of only 16,000. Then again that was the Royalties for Regions Rort so… Anyway, beautiful building, lucky for them, truly.

We watched the “My name is Gulpili” documentary, which as very long and very slow but fascinating and a different way of storytelling. From there it was back to the hotel, a chill and then a ride to the airport for our flight home at 5:30.

We landed back in a very wet Perth around 7pm, dropped Justin home and got back into our cold house and cuddled the cat. A fun long weekend all up.