How to avoid Drop Bears (or perhaps not...)

When last I metaphorically put quill to parchment, I was in Kalbarri, snoozing off a big fish dinner and not getting up in the morning to bid adieu to my travelling companions of the previous day. After enjoying a pleasant lie-in (the beds at Kalbarri YHA are quite comfy, if I remember rightly - my only complaint about the place was that there were nowhere near enough bathrooms and toilets...), I spent part of that first day engaged in such pedestrian pursuits as going to the shops to get in supplies, nearly collapsing in horror at the cost of internet access, and sitting on a park bench looking out on the Indian Ocean. Realising just how little there actually is to do in Kalbarri, I also booked myself onto a trip for the following day, which my previous driver, Scoobs, had recommended - I was going canoe-ing on the Murchison River in Kalbarri National Park.

I have to admit to never really having gotten into canoes much as a kid. Usually because one of the first things you'd be asked to do, at least in a kayak, was to capsize the damned thing, and then get it upright again. I know the safety rationale behind it. I understand why they ask kids to do it (nobody likes a lawsuit or a corpse on their hands). But, as a child with a fairly hefty phobia about sticking my head under the water, that just wasn't going to be for me. Which is a shame, because I've actually found that as an adult I rather like being out in both canoes and kayaks (although this new-found liking was tested somewhat later in the trip, but that's another 5 weeks or so down the line...).

At any rate, the guy running the operation was a pretty sound bloke, although he did have the habit, common to many tour guides in northern Australia, of dressing a bit like Steve Irwin. Yes, safari shorts really are worn by some people in all seriousness, and many tour companies in Oz provide logo'd safari shirts. There is refreshingly not too much of the whole "CRIKEY!" thing going on, but you almost start to expect it.

Now that I remember it, I wasn't the only person to leave the bus on that first day. There was also quite a pleasant English couple, whose names I believe may have been Kevin and Jeanette (I know he was a Kev, but I'm not 100% sure on her name...). I remember this because they were actually on the canoe trip as well. There were also a couple of Americans with us, though I think they were friends travelling together and not necessarily a couple. Damn, I'm really missing that sodding notebook.

So, our first stops for the day were the usual lookouts in the National Park - there's a couple of them, at either ends of a track that kind of forms the top of a 'T' with the access track for the Park as the upright. So we went and got our photos looking up the river from the Z Bend (where the river does kind of a Z-bend), and down the river from the Loop (where the river goes around almost in a full loop), the latter framed quite wonderfully by a natural rock formation which is basically a window. In light of this, the Australians have called it Nature's Window.

Those who've been to Australia will be familiar with this, but for those who haven't, it's worth noting that there are 4 themes followed when naming places: 1) Use the aboriginal name (unfortunately not as common as it should be) eg Wagga Wagga, Purnululu, Geelong, Wollongong. 2) Name it after a place in Britain eg Norfolk, Sheffield, Brighton, the Grampians, Perth. 3) Name it after an historical figure from Britain or Australia eg Sydney, Adelaide, Cooktown. 4) Look at it, decide what the most bloody obvious thing you can say about it is, then call it that eg Nature's Window, Circular Head, the Remarkable Rocks, 7 Mile Beach.

Anyway, getting back to the narrative, we wandered around at the lookouts, took photos (of each other when requested), wondered where Kev had gotten to (he was somewhat hyperactive and prone to wandering off...), swatted away some of the local insect life and headed back to the bus. We then headed back out towards the main road, before pulling over at the side of the road where our guide told us it was time for our little hike down to the river. Deciding that this would be a good way of working off some of the calorie intake from the fish dinner of a couple of nights ago, I happily got into the walking spirit (probably because it was all downhill at this point). However, before we could depart we encountered an Aussie school-group or youth-group or something who, on hearing the American accents, immediately decided that fun was to be had. Yes, they proudly informed the Yanks that there were Drop Bears down the track.

Again, this is one of those things you just pick up whilst travelling in Australia. Having got monumentally bored with fielding the same questions over and over about various bits of Australia's native fauna, particularly Kangaroos and "Koala Bears" ( the Koala, phascolarctos cinereus, is not even remotely related to bears...), the Australian populace apparently decided some time ago that some variety was needed. And so the Drop Bear was born. I've never seen a definitive Latin name for it, but it's ecology is fairly well-established. It looks like a bigger, meaner Koala, with Big Pointed Teeth, lives in gum trees, and drops on unsuspecting victims from above, grabbing their head and (if you believe some of the stories) attempting to eat it This is a fairly classic sample site of Drop-Bear myths. There's also an entry in Wikipedia. One "fact" that I hadn't been acquainted with prior to my trip to WA, though was that the beasts can be deterred by spreading Vegemite on your face (the young Australians kindly offered to do this for our American comrades, stating that they had a tube of it with them for just such eventualities) - I had always heard that they were deterred by wearing a very bright, silvery hat as they would then see themselves in it (like a mirror) and thus be deterred from attacking.

Anyways, having kindly declined the offer of assistance in avoiding murderous marsupials, we got back onto the trail and headed down to the river. I must have been feeling enthusiastic, as I just about kept up with the ever-energetic Kev. On arrival down there, we had some quick morning tea (yes, I know, it seems oh-so-English, but the Aussies are quite into their tea as well, and this was not merely tea, but tea and biscuits - though, not being all that partial to tea, for me I just drank some water; I still had the biccies, though!) before setting out for a leisurely canoe trip along one of the middle sections of the river. All very easy going, through beautiful gorge country. Classic Aussie scenery - red rocks, green plants in gullies and the like, cobalt blue sky and blue-green river. And a gorgeous sunny day. You couldn't really ask for all that much more.

On paddling back to our canoe departure point, we settled down for some lunch, then sat around chatting while it settled before starting the climb back out. Oh yes, the immutable laws of physics strike again. When you go down into a river gorge, that means at some point that you have to climb back out of it. And normally this would be the cue for me to start on about how I'm not built for going uphill, and shouldn't have drunk so much beer recently, and so on ad nauseam. Except in this case, I actually rather liked it. In fact, it was great fun, largely because we didn't just retrace our steps, but actually went up the side of the gorge, making it more like a bit of very tame rock-climbing rather than uphill hiking.

Having gone back to the bus, we then headed up to another lookout, this one looking back towards the town, from which you could see the way the river sets up the whole countryside. You could also, unfortunately, see the municipal rubbish dump if you looked the other way (though only at a long distance - it was just like a clearing area in the greenery of the bush). But there's no need to kill the moment, is there? Just think about the beautiful late afternoon sun, the greenery, the blue sky, the fantastic view. Don't think about the rubbish. Damnit!

On returning to the town, I had another very quiet night (I was due a few, after my karaoke-related excesses the previous week). I had a very quiet next day as well, enlivened by picking up a couple of books from a second-hand shop, and by watching the sunset down at the beach. Then, in the evening, I met up with the next bus-load of Easyriders coming through town. But I'll save that for next time.

Cheers,

Pat