Borden 26 December 2006

After saying goodbye to our camp friends we sent off for the Stirling Ranges. This is one of the largest national parks in WA and has a number of tall craggy mountains – covered in vibrant green plants that were very rugged, coarse and spiky! They seemed very primitive with the leaves and the flower heads from a Banksia plant seeming to come straight out of the ground. The range is unique because of the silhouettes of each mountain. There is every opportunity to imagine the Aboriginal myths. The most important one tells the story of an old man kangaroo who went of playing each day and not hunting. The wife kangaroo got fed up with this, went off hunting, made a feast, ate it all and when he came home, he became enraged him and spears her to dead, so the young kangaroo son chases and kills him. The mountain peaks are then the shape of the deceased kangaroo lying down in death! The drive is about 42kms each way on gravel and the car proved its worth yet again. We rested for a cuppa in a gully called White Gum Camp and imagined the Aboriginals living here. After we left, we set off for a tiny village called Borden and set up at the showground. Walked around the town in 15 mins (pub was shut) and observed yet another wheat storage area bigger than the town!