Last week we rented a bunch of videos and one that i nabbed was the 1959 Cold War film On The Beach from the novel by Neville Shute. Vicki had mentioned that she had never seen the film, although she had read all of Shute's books. The film is about Australia, and focuses on a young couple- the young man is in the Navy. Shots of downtown Melbourne, dominated by bicycles and horse-drawn buggies gradually introduce the fact that a nuclear war has killed everyone in the Northern Hemisphere. Australia survives, but everyone is destined to perish in about six months when the radioactive dust in the atmosphere reaches the continent. In black and white, with Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner and Fred Astaire, the film is a classic about the response of people to the inevitability of their own extinction.

Saturday morning we arose early, as I had organized an "official RCS field trip and tutorial on 4-wheel-driving" for my students- i.e. a picnic to Lennard Gorge. This was a 184 Km jaunt up the Gibb River Road, the first time we had been up that highway. We took two vehicles having been warned that it is not uncommon for people to lose 2 or 3 tires to sharp rocks in the outback. Since one of the students has a vehicle that matches the RCS Nissan Patrol, we can "share spares" if need be. Michael and Owen made the supreme sacrifice of getting up early on a Saturday morning and putting off their studying for a day.

We got started a bit after 7 AM for the trip. The first 74 Km of the highway is "sealed" or paved, but this is using the term generously. About 20 Km out of Derby the paved part becomes one lane down the middle with 1/2 lane wide gravel shoulders on each side. One needs to keep a sharp lookout not only for cows, but for oncoming vehicles. Fortunately traffic is light- we saw only 21 other vehicles in an entire 400+ km trip.

First stop was the Lennard River crossing where we took a leg stretch, had a snack and admired the river bed with its smoothly worn stones. Shortly thereafter we found some emus on the road. Crossing the Napier Range, we encountered Queen Victoria's Head and could not resist making our own Queen Victoria strike a pose! [Click picture for enlargement]


After this the road rises up over the King Leopold range, with spectacular views of land that seemingly goes on forever, with no fences, no cell towers, or power or phone lines in view at all. There is no obvious sign of human habitation or even transit beyond the gravel road. This is the only time I can remember ever seeing such an unmarked landscape in my lifetime. For Vicki, its the first time she has seen anything like it since the pampas of Uruguay when she was 12.

Another hour and we turn off on a very rough 4WD track for the 8 km ride to the Lennard Gorge carpark. We pack up and put on hiking boots. Its a solid uphill kilometer walk to the top of the hill, then a rocky scramble down a stream bed of round red boulders to the top of the gorge. The Lennard river is roaring by now, and we climb down into the cool of the gorge and find we are the only ones here, with a deep green pool and beautiful waterfalls. By now we are very hot from the hike, so we change into bathers and climb down into the water. Its a great swim, against a stiff current, to the base of the waterfalls. We sit on the rocks under the falls, float on our backs and admire the eagles soaring overhead between the red rocks, and just enjoy the magic of the place. The rocks are so smooth, but hard granite shot through with white veins of quartz. This cleft in the Earth must have taken a million years to cut- especially since the river only runs during the wet.

We sunbathe on the rocks and eat our lunch. I review the 32 points to remember about driving a 4WD in 5 minutes and give the boys the handout: tutorial finished, and its time for another swim. This time Vicki peeks over a rock on the way into the river and finds herself face to face with a 2 foot goanna. It is unafraid, and lets us get a foot away. It opens its mouth, and I am close enough to see its tiny teeth and black tongue. Even sans glasses, I admire the speckled camouflage pattern of its scales.

2 PM and we have to leave this place. I have developed a great appreciation for the hundreds of thousands of miles of barbed-wire fence in the American landscape, if only because they allow us to drive at night without fearing for our lives if we encounter a cow. There are cows on the road all the time, and the last sunset hour, as we tiredly near Derby is an effort in concentration and frustration, as we have to stop frequently to clean bugs off the smeary windshield so we can keep a sharp eye peeled. But we only see one roo scamper past and are soon home safely. (Click the picture below to open the photo album:)

Lennard Gorge

Sunday we are so tired we sleep in till 9, but then clean the car and the house windows while we are at it. We walk out to the jetty- its King Tide Day, with tides up to 11.5 meters this week, the highest of the year. There is a celebration on the jetty with food stalls, art auction and booths. The local Aboriginal kids are climbing up on top of the ore-conveyor and jumping 8 to 10 meters into the swift, crocodile-inhabited currents around the jetty, laughing with delight; not an adult in sight.

But life is short, especially compared to the age of the Earth, the Deep Time it took to carve Lennard Gorge, to create the waterfalls. I reflect about On The Beach, which I believe is not so much an anti-war movie, as an existential commentary on all our shared fates. "What would you do if you knew your time was very limited?" Swimming in Lennard Gorge, I realize I am also On The Beach. We all are.