Monday, 17 April 2023
Today we visited the Burrup Peninsula: the Ngajarli area of the Murujuga National Park, as well as the communities of Dampier and Karratha.
Ngajarli Trail
Ngajarli is the site of over 50,000 petroglyphs of the Ngarda-Ngarli people. The Murujuga National Park may contain about 1 million petroglyphs, making it the home of the largest rock art collection in the world.
 |
| The Ngajarli Trail area is dominated by small hills of rusty red rock and plains of spinifex grasss. |
 |
| The "standing stones" at the top of one hill mark a communal burial site. |
 |
| The Ngajarli Trail was developed for visitors to view ancient petroglyphs, some of which may be 40,000 years old. |
 |
| Petroglyph of a dugong tail. A dugong is similar to a manatee - both are called "sea cows". |
 |
| Petroglyph of a Tasmanian devil. |
 |
Emu petroglyph
|
 |
Petroglyph
|
 |
| Petroglyph of a person with arms raised - meaning "Danger - stay away - do not climb." With this exception, we were asked not to take photos of petroglyphs depicting people. |
 |
| Kangaroo petroglyph. |
 |
| Orb-weaver spider along the Ngajarli Trail. |
Dampier
Dampier is the original European settlement in this area, and has become an industrial center for natural gas, nitrates, and iron ore. Nearby Karratha is now larger and has the local airport.
 |
| Dampier is the home of the legendary "Red Dog", a crossbreed kelpie/cattle dog whose travels through the Pilbara region of Western Australia were the subject of two feature films. |
 |
| The industrial nature of Dampier was evident even before we docked. This is a natural gas (LNG) plant. |
 |
| An ore ship leaving Dampier. |
 |
| The nitrate plant directly across the road from the Ngajarli Trail. |
 |
| Salt is another Dampier commodity. |
 |
| And another sunset as we sail to tomorrow. |
No comments:
Post a Comment