Wyndham

With no sign of the trailer bolts arriving it looked like we would be spending another day in Kununurra.  Wyndham looked like a potential visit location and we decided to drive the 100km north to explore the area.

There are two parts to Wyndham.  The town and then further north is Wyndham Port.  It's the most northerly town in Western Australia and was established in the late 1800's to support the newly found goldfields at Halls Creek.  You might recall Halls Creek is where we initially stopped during our search for a replacement trailer suspension bolt.

The first European explorer to reach the region was Phillip Parker King who had been tasked with finding a river that would lead to the centre of Australia. He sailed into the gulf, which he named Cambridge Gulf, after the Duke of Cambridge and then up the river which was subsequently named after him, King River.  Finding the river didn't go into the centre of Australia and the area was mostly mudflats and salt plains, he departed.

Wikipedia states "By late-1886, the town was booming and there were three hotels at the port, one of which was a two-storey building, and two taverns at Three Mile Camp, as well as stores, bootmakers' and butchers' shops, a billiard room, a soda water factory, commission agencies, auctioneers and other businesses.^] Ships brought in at least five thousand miners who headed off to the Halls Creek goldfields. It is known that during this boom there were times when up to 16 vessels were moored in Cambridge Gulf."

Within two years the gold had petered out and Wyndham went into steady decline.  Things got so bad that by 1912 money had virtually disappeared from the Wyndham economy, and purchases were paid for using promissory notes known as "shinplasters".

That started to change the following year when the government decided to construct a meatworks.  The project was delayed by WW1 but operations stated in 1919 and continued until 1985.

Wyndham Port on the Cambridge Gulf

'Kaiser'  The oldest surviving internal combustion locomotive in Australia.  Built in Germany in 1912. Benzene was used to start the engine and after 2 minutes it was switched over to kerosene.

Behind it is 'Preston'.  Built in England in 1890 and shipped to Wyndham in 1920.  Both locomotives were used until 1960 transporting meat from the meatworks to the port.

During WW2 Wyndham Port was bombed several times by the Japanese.

The town and port had a brief resurgence in important as the main entry point for material required to construct the Ord River Scheme.  However the associated construction of Kununurra saw it's subsequent demise.  The current population is less than 1000 with 54% being of Aboriginal or Torres Island descent.

One other interesting feature of the town is the small Afghan Cemetery located at the end of a dirt track just south of the town.

This contained a number of graves of early Afghan settlers who provided transport between towns and cattle stations with camels and donkeys.  They were tolerated, but not assimilated, into the community and appeared to live a solitary existence.  None appeared to have brought their families with them and when the need for camels passed they had either already died or returned home.  Interestingly the definition "Afghan" is incorrect as most of them came from Peshawar, in what is now Northern Pakistan.

Some of the graves were quite large which the locals believe is a consequence of the lead camel being buried with his master.  

Upon our return to Kununurra we stopped at the Post Office to see if our package had arrived.  I was quite disappointed to hear that the package would be another week because it had been sent BY ROAD!  You might recall I asked for it to be sent express air freight.

We had a timetable to maintain and couldn't wait another week in Kununurra.  Thinking quickly we went searching for an engineering shop that could sell us a replacement bolt of the right diameter and length.  It wouldn't have the camber adjustment head but was also not likely to break.  The worst that could happen would be any wheel misalignment would result in excessive tyre wear.  Fortunately we were able to source a bolt which meant we could depart tomorrow for the next outback part of our trip.