“We’ve left the 4WD track and expect at this rate it will be 2 more days until we get to the Moran. Still pretty hot and camped tonight under a large Baobab tree and that’s about it; this place is incredibly remote.

But at the camp tonight there are some aboriginal cave paintings which are outstanding. All doing well but looking forward to seeing the water in a couple of day’s time ….. T”.

This is hopefully the last full day walking they expected to make before getting to the Moran.

Here’s a summation from the phone call from them that night:

“About 20 ks done today in mid 30 degree weather and still really humid, with the plan still being that the boats will be dropped off this Sunday by helicopter at the Moran.

Another tough day with storms all around and hot but happily enough drinking water given the high temperatures.  All in good spirits but keen to be soon finished with this stage of the trip. More aboriginal paintings found again today. Caleb”

Caleb gave this phone report at the end of this day ….

“Only needed to do 8 k’s today and got to the Moran as planned at lunchtime for cleaning up and fishing etc …. Just great to be here and we’re about to prepare for the paddling ahead. The plan is that the chopper arrives on Sunday morning with the boats and we make a start on the water in the afternoon.

Currently the water level is quite low but around the area is high grass and marshy land, with more cave paintings seen on the way today. If we get on the water as predicted tomorrow, we hope to be on the Moran for 5 days, with the first gorge section expected as early as this Sunday.

Excited to be here, more to follow …. Caleb.

“The boats arrived as predicted and today we hit the water at last. Still pretty low levels but we are expecting some increase in water levels in the next day or so, as 3 other rivers will feed in water that is coming from a storm system nearby.

All well with us and got into some great fishing too which has helped greatly on the fresh food front. This is such an incredibly wild and remote place; we were expecting it of course but it’s surpassed our expectations.

The plan still stands to do about 80 – 100k’s on the Moran, then portage about 17 k’s to get to the Mitchell, paddle down to the Mitchell River Falls and run them if we can and ultimately walk out to the Mitchell River Plateau air-strip.

Good spirits here and love to all in The Outer World, as it seems to us ………T”.

Yappa’s phone report at the end of their second day on the Moran, it was really clear reception on the Sat Phone, so more details were possible:

“Our first full day today on the Moran and it was a great one. As predicted, pretty flat for most of it but through some impressive small gorges too. Found the first real rapid which we named “Naked Arse Falls” as we all paddled it in the raw (photos available on the WFD pay-site).

We all ran it and it was a smooth, clean slide and Class 4, as were the rest of the rapids this day with 3’s and 4’s being standard.

During the day, we saw a large colony of bats on one side of the river and Caleb spotted a gallery of indigenous art on the other with the theme being bats as well. That’s something that has struck us all; just how ancient this place is and who knows how long the bats and the paintings have been there. Quite possibly for millennia ….

We had our croc knives out for the first time today, as we have seen a lot of freshwater crocs tracks. We’re not too worried about them but took the step of camping high up on the bank away from the river to avoid being some reptile’s dinner.

The floods have been through here recently and we’re not sure if the water will have pushed the serious ones, the saltwater crew, further downstream, or if it’s the case that they could have swum further upstream. We simply can’t tell but it’s now the time to become cautious.

Our chopper pilot Butch, said that crocs are incredibly resilient and we’ve got to be bloody careful and we definitively will.

Pandanus palms everywhere which are taxing to weave between but things improved when we reached the confluence of the North and South arms of the Moran, where the river flow immediately doubled which made things easier.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) is Box Canyon day which is pretty certainly going to be the crux of the trip on the Moran. Butch says that when he flies over it, even directly above, it’s impossible to see the river due to the depth of the canyon walls. There is simply no way we can tell what it’s like but that’s the sort of thing that makes a first descent in such a wild area so appealing. We just don’t know!

We’ve pretty well made the decision to start the portage to the Mitchell as soon as we’re out of the canyon, as the likelihood of saltwater crocs is too high past that point and we just can’t risk a confrontation with one.

The weather has been consistently hot so far, with cloudless blue skies on the walk-in but some clouds and a little rain while on the river but nothing significant.

We’ve been doing the Hunter and Gatherer thing as well and had a great dinner on Sunday from the 8 fish we caught, then desert blackberries and passionfruit and I found a bush potato which I am proud of for some strange reason!

The only sign we’ve seen of anything non-native were some really wild cattle, led by a dominant male. So dominant that it followed us down the river for several k’s and then got around ahead of us and proceeded to block the river.

We all have such a strong impression that we really are in a completely remote place, untouched and unexplored by anyone from the outside world apart from the original inhabitants.

No tracks, no habitation, no signs of anything apart from the rock art that’s probably impossibly old. Simply a real privileged to be here.

We’re all doing really well and looking forward to the canyon tomorrow ….. Anthony”.

Reasonable clarity on the phone yesterday with Swarz; this below give a run-down of their day’s progress.

“We thought that today was going to be the real day in the Box Canyon Gorge (BCG) but it hasn’t proven to be the case but the tempo of the river has been picking up. Some great paddling to be had as we went through 2 canyons today which contained three Class 4 - 5 rapids which were all drop-pool in style which allowed us plenty of time to scout what was coming ahead.

All the rapids are caused by large boulders and none contain any jammed logs. We all paddled well today and only Caleb took a minor thrashing in one of them but with no ill-effect.

It’s all sandstone rock here and the amount of rock-art has been continuously high, with caves being common and paintings really frequently in them too.

Another camp tonight by a large pool in this part of the gorge section, with more fishing to be had and a significant thunder storm, lightning and rain but nothing substantial is expected from it by way of increased water levels. Where we are now has high rock walls and even though we’ve seen lots of freshwater beasts, they are very timid and present no risk at all.

We’ll try and get through all of BCG proper tomorrow and reckon we’ll still finish the Moran at that point, due to our anxiety about the crocs of the saltwater type but we’ll have to wait and see how exactly it pans out.

None of us are looking forward to the expected 4 days hike across to the Mitchell, as this time we’ll have everything with us, including the boats.  We’ve got specialist harnesses to carry them with but the thought of leaving the water again, is not something any of us are looking forward to.

Everything’s going great and spirits are high, WFD out for the night”.