The Kimberley 2017: Saturday 20 May - to Drysdale River Station

Today we left the APT Mitchell Falls camp (wilderness lodge) which had been splendid. We had two walks planned today to view aboriginal rock art. This was magnificent. Much better than the site we saw years ago in Kakadu at Obirr Rock.

We saw lots of wandjina and also lots of what are known as Bradshaw paintings.

The first wandjina we saw George told the dreaming story of two different clans who had a war with each other. They were throwing stones for a long time and no-one was winning. So they dropped their stones down and rested. This area with lots of wandjina paintings is covered with large boulders.
Wanjina is the weather spirit and the snake or rainbow serpent represents the land – rivers and mountains.

There were lots of wildflowers, the delicate flowers were hard to photograph en masse

Wandjinas with a kangaroo above them which is their way of depicting that the kangaroos live high in the rocky outcrops

Echidna

This is how we had to capture the previous two photographs!

Lots of boulders in this area which lays claim to the Dreaming story of the fighting clans

Some of the detail is difficult to capture. It was simply amazing seeing it all

In one painting there is clearly a family group, and a hunter with a possum. Researchers trying to date these paintings removed a wasp nest which had been built on top of the picture. Scientists dated this to be 17,000 years old. Now the puzzle is to date the paintings themselves. All they know is they are older than 17,000 years. These are very significant paintings because of what they depict and although the jury is still out on their exact age, it is believed they are the oldest pictographs in the world.

These are some of the oldest paintings in the country - dubbed 'Bradshaws'

Trying to keep up with all the information we were given

Captain Joe Bradshaw took up the lease of Drysdale River Station after it was established by Charles Burrows in 1886. He never used he lease. He also took a lease of an area near the Prince Regent River to the north west of Drysdale River.

While trying to reach these leases in April 1891 he was the first to see the style of paintings which have become known as “Bradshaws”. He sketched them and later a biographer writing about the findings called them Bradshaws and the name has stuck. It is now known they are Gwian Gwian clan paintings. Wandjina paintings are much younger. It was not until 1998 that these paintings were found again as Bradshaw had been unsure of their exact location.

Map of the area showing where Bradshaw started his trek to Drysdale River

These are the two main groups of paintings in the area. The photo with George explaining what is depicted is one of the oldest in the area. It is of women dancing with their braided and decorated hair.

Lots of lovely wildflowers everywhere

After the two walks, we headed for the King Edward River picnic area where we could have a swim in the river. So after a terrific lunch Ian and I went and changed for a dip in the river. Then we walked a bit downstream to take some photographs of the cascades which are still flowing quite rapidly. It was wonderful to cool off.