Wednesday, 13 May 2026
We have spent the last month driving on the Stuart Highway, but for a couple of side trips. The Stuart Highway runs north-south between Port Augusta and Darwin for a total of 2,720 kilometres. We missed two small sections of that. The first between Erldunda and Alice Springs (197 kilometres) and the second between the intersection with the Arnhem Highway and the intersection with Crater Lake Road (61 kilometres). So, we drove 2,462 kilometres of the Stuart Highway, which is the second longest section of Highway 1, which ultimately circumnavigates the whole of Australia.
Today, we drove out of Katherine, to start heading west on the Victoria Highway. Of course, still on Highway 1, but now with a different name. We made our first stop at the Buntine Memorial at the beginning of the Buntine Highway (Hwy 96) named for Noel Buntine, who modernized the cattle and transport industry in this part of Australia. We learnt about Noel yesterday at the Katherine Museum and now we were standing at the beginning of the highway named in his honour. We were happy that we weren’t travelling that way as it looked pretty rough.
The Victoria Highway had quite a bit of end of wet season tidying up going on. We encountered the team slashing the grass on the side of the road and a number of sections where controlled burning was taking place near the roadside. It’s a bit disconcerting seeing the smoke and occasionally actual flames beside the road, with no sign of anyone supervising things to make sure the controlled burning does not get out of control.
In the lead up to arriving at the Victoria River Roadhouse we drove through the dramatic escarpments of the northernmost section of the Judbarra / Gregory National Park. After crossing the Victoria River we pulled into the roadhouse. The plan was to take a comfort break BUT the facilities were closed for cleaning. Deciding that we could hang on, we walked back to the bridge to take photos of the river.
Departing the roadhouse, we spied the sign for the Victoria River Boat Ramp. We decided to drive down to the boat ramp, hoping for a pretty river vista. Ha, no such luck! Back out on the highway we spotted another sign for the Joe Creek Picnic Area. With time to spare today (we’re going to gain an hour and a half at the border) we turned off again. Thank goodness, the picnic area was more attractive than the boat ramp. With no-one else there, we used the bush toilet … and then I spotted the drop toilet. Rather suspect that the open air loo was probably a better option??!
More spectacular vistas with the Fitzroy Range to the left of us and the Emu Plain and Bynoe Range to the right of us. Nowhere to pull over for photos though, so we’ll just have to commit that scenery to memory. We made another very short stop at the Durack Monument, just after we crossed Timber Creek. Originally from Ireland, the family settled in Queensland where they prospered despite regular drought periods. They then speculated on land in the distant, remote Kimberley area and in 1883 set out to overland 7,520 head of cattle 3,000 miles to the Ord River. Despite hardships, the Durack pastoral empire lasted until 1950.
We arrived in the small settlement of Timber Creek, where we stopped at the BP Servo for lunch. The United Servo was the first establishment arriving from the east, but Bernie didn’t like the look of it so, the BP Servo it was. We actually purchased some quite good beef, pickle and salad sandwiches.
After finishing our sandwiches, Bernie re-entered Kununurra into Apple Maps, which suggested an alternative route to Kununurra due to a bushfire alert. Slight problem, the alternative route was going to take us more than 15 hours! Bernie was sure that ‘someone’ must have put an alert on Apple Maps after seeing smoke that was ‘probably’ just controlled burning. I checked with Google Maps and was somewhat reassured that it was showing the direct route to Kununurra on the Victoria Highway, estimated to take 2 hours and 39 minutes. Phew!
We hadn’t travelled far when, sure enough, we passed signs saying that controlled burning was taking place. Besides which, all the smoke was on the other side of Victoria River so, even if it were to get out of control, it would have to jump the river to be any threat to us. So confident was Bernie that we stopped at Bradshaw Bridge, so he could take a photo of the smoke across the river. Without stepping foot on the actual bridge, because the bridge provides access to the Bradshaw Field Training Area and there were signs saying no unauthorized vehicular or pedestrian traffic on the bridge.
Leaving the smoke behind us, we travelled through more spectacular scenery as we passed the Pinkerton Range. We also started to see lots of baobab trees growing in the wild. All the same species – because we only have one species, Adansonia gregorii, in Australia – the trees appeared dead, nearly dead and in full leaf. It was quite strange that they appeared so varied in their habit. And some of them were HUGE!
About four kilometres before we reached the Western Australian border, our devices switched over to Australian Western Standard Time, so we gained an hour and a half. We arrived at the WA / NT Border Quarantine Checkpoint. We pulled in and turned off the truck, as requested. The quarantine officer quizzed us about what we were carrying, then followed up with a check of the contents of the fridge. After a quick look, he declared that we were good to go. And, now that we were actually in WA, our devices switched back to Central Standard Time. Obviously we’re pinging off different towers so close to the border.
Arriving in Kununurra about 2.00pm local time, we made our way to the Discovery Parks – Lake Kununurra. We moved our gear into the cabin which is OK, but not in the same class as the cabin in Katherine. The quality of the cabin in Katherine is going to be hard to beat going forward. Not even at the half way mark yet, we may have peaked too early, ha, ha. One thing our cabin here does have in its favour, a full size fridge with a separate freezer, not just one of those dinky freezer shelves in the top of the mini fridge.
No Woolies in Kununurra, we had to pick between Coles and IGA. Google told Bernie that IGA’s fruit and veg is better so we went there first. Hmmn, on the plus side, they had a pineapple. We still cannot believe how hard it has been to buy pineapples when we are in the tropics. The rest of the fruit at the IGA did not look appetizing. Off to Coles, where their fruit and veg section looked just like it does in Melbourne. We purchased some salad items to go with home-cooked pasta tonight.
Arriving back at the park, we pulled into the wrong cabin!! Parked the car, tried to open the door. Oops! The worst part, there were people sitting on the verandah of the cabin next door, so they were witnesses to our blunder. And then, when they saw our Vic number plates they gave us a bit of a ribbing. Oh, well, no real harm done. We’ll recover from our red faces.
Yay, we found time and Splices to enjoy Splice o’clock … when we found our way to the correct cabin. We purchased a new box of Splices while we were at Coles, feeling confident that a full-sized fridge freezer will be able to keep them frozen for the next few days. Fingers crossed.
Finally used the home-made pesto from our freezer to whip up some penne pasta with chorizo, sun-dried tomatoes and pesto stirred through. We enjoyed that for dinner with some salad on the side.
Steps: 5,790 (3.76kms)
