Pentecost crossing
Time to pack up again and head into Kununurra. We were looking forward to crossing the Pentecost River. I was trying to convince Jacky that she should walk across with the video camera so she could film me as I drove across but I was getting nowhere. There was a remote possibility of there being crocodiles near the crossing. So I thought maybe I could drive across, leave her on the bank, turn around, drive back and then across again just for the camera but as we left Home Valley it soon became quite obvious that just getting to the crossing would be a mission, having the time to double back would not be possible. 200 – 300 cyclists and their support vehicles were on the move, we joined the convoy about half way along. It was slow going, about 20 km/hr and there were limited opportunities to overtake. The dust was incredible, Jacky & I struggled to understand why you would want to ride a push bike on a rough dusty road with the temperature in the mid-thirties. Every time a vehicle passed, even slowly, the dust clouds covered the cyclists.

Traffic Jam at the Pentecost River

Finally we arrived at the Pentecost crossing, it was like peak hour traffic as they allowed a group of cyclists to cross, then support vehicles, then more cyclists. It took nearly half an hour before it was our turn and on the other side there was no space to stop and take photos so we just had to keep going. The cyclists were spending the night at El Questro station and it was only as we approached the station turn off that the number of cyclists started to thin out.
We had been having a little trouble with the Waeco fridge in the trailer, it was stopping and starting and the temperature was slowly rising, so the first stop in Kununurra was to get the trailer batteries checked. Sure enough one had failed, but even with that replaced the fridge would still not run properly so they put me on to the local refrigeration mechanic who happens to be the local Waeco dealer. He was able to lend us a fridge while he checked ours out. Fortunately it appeared that it was only the lower voltage that was upsetting the circuitry and there was no fault with the fridge.
By this time it was nearly 3 o’clock so we decided to leave our shopping to Fri and we headed out to Lake Argyle Caravan Park to set up camp. I was having some reservations about camping 70kms out of town but the location is spectacular, though I was a little disappointed that there was no mobile coverage.

Lake Argyle

With all the spectacular hills around Lake Argyle all it would take is one antenna and Telstra would have coverage for 100kms.