Mitchell Falls/Port Warrender lookout/Surveyor's Pool

Monday 15 July 2013

Mitchell Falls/Surveyor’s Pool/Port Warrener lookout

We were up early today at first light. Everyone had had a reasonable night’s sleep given the circumstances. Breakfast comprised of cereal and milk. We packed up and were ready for departure by 7.30am. Paul had booked a helicopter flight for 0930 for both him and me for a flight over the fall. Because we were ready to go so early I suggested that we head out to Surveyor’s Pool, about 30 km one way, and then come back to catch the helicopter flight. We had only gone about 10km and had not even reached the turnoff to Port Warrender when we decided to turn back and return to Mitchell Falls. That little episode cost us nearly an hour in time. Before we left, Paul had changed the flight from 9.30 to 10.30am. As we were back at around 8.45am I asked if we could go back to the original time of 9.30am. To my great surprise they said yes so we only had to wait 5 minutes before briefing and heading out to the helicopter. The return flight over the falls was no longer than 10 minutes and cost us $115 each. A very good price in anybody’s book.

SlingAir operated the Bell 200 Jetmaster helicopters of which 4 were in location. Their main customers were the tour groups doing the Gibb – the packages offered were to either walk in to the gorge and
 

Falls from chopper

Paul with video camera

Port Warrender lookout

Surveyor's Pool

fly back or fly in and walk back. The choppers can hold 5 people – the pilot and 4 pax. We had the chopper to ourselves and given that the doors were removed on all the choppers we had uninterrupted views of the surrounding landscape. We flew over the falls in 3 circuits at about 500 feet so you can imagine the views that we got. Paul kept his video camera rolling for the duration and I took countless photos in the hope of taking several good shots. The flight had to be one of the highlights of the trip.

After the flight, we drove out to the road to Port Warrender road some 14 km from the Mitchell Falls. The drive to Port Warrender was 41km but we drove to the lookout to Port Warrender. The plateau drops at this point and gives a good view of the Admiralty Gulf. So in essence we drove 22 km to the lookout and then 3 km back to the turnoff to Surveyor’s Pool a further 10km off the road. The tracks can only be described as that – tracks and required 4wd high range for most of the drive.

Our drive into Surveyor’s Pool required 4wd low range in several places and was quite exhilarating despite the beating the Nissan took. The trip into the Pool was very slow as we were in first gear on many occasions. The temperature was around 35 degrees for most of the day with no breeze. However the Nissan handled the roads ok.

 

The walk into Surveyor’s Pool was very hot although on flat level ground with little shade from trees. It was only 800m but felt longer and to top it off we could not swim and cool off given the warning about salt water crocodiles in the lower Mitchell. After some photos we drove out and headed back to King Edward crossing a distance of 90km on a bloody rough road. I handed over driving to Paul once we reached the turnoff to Mitchell Falls and he drove back. It was a good experience for him and whilst rough and slow, I believe that he quite enjoyed himself. We returned back to home base about 4pm after a long day in the vehicle.

Everything was quite disorganised when we got back to camp as all the equipment was mixed up. However we settled on a cup of tea and then headed off to find some falls 300m downstream. We jumped in and found the water cool and refreshing. Others were swimming and let us know that a small freshwater croc was lying on a rock near where we were swimming. This did not deter us as we just wanted to wash all the dust and sweat off us and cool down. We were starting to run low on drinking water as both King Edward and Mitchell Falls have no drinking water provided – just river water which they advise not to drink unless boiled. That night Robert cooked up steak, mashed potato, peas and beetroot. We had run out of milk so Paul happily shared his decaffeinated coffee satchels that had milk powder in them. We watched a movie called the Seven Psycho’s – it had taken Robert seven days to relent to watching it but in the end he folded and I think quite enjoyed it. As we had no generator times we kept the generator running till 9pm when we headed off to bed.