KUNUNURRA

We had a good meal down on the wharf at Darwin - at Christo's. World Renowned For Our SeaFood, the sign said, and it was pretty good. The octopus I ordered was delicious. Not the effete baby octopus we have come to expect Down South, but healthy chunks of really mature beasts.

It was good sitting in the shade with the warm sea breeze blowing, watching two rig tenders dock. We had a bit of a laugh shouting ribald resonses to the tannoy enhanced queries of the skippers - all rather silly really, but we were having fun and relaxing and everyone else was working.

Later in the afternoon we drifted back to won and browsed through the art galleries. Terry chose a fine X-ray painting of a barramundi. I picked up a souvenir flint knife for myself. I never realised how sharp those knives are. Then we headed off to the airport through the heat haze of the afternoon.

There is a limited selection of flights from Darwin to Perth. We were lucky to be on a flight with only one scheduled stop - at Kununurra. Some drop down at all the patches of civilisation in the vast Kimberely area, taking seven or eight hours for the trip. We would do it in five and a half hours unless there was a full load and a head wind. Then we would have to land at Port Hedland to refuel adding another hour to the journey.

Check in was slow, but then so is Darwin. An unfortunate young German mother with a child on her hip was trying to check in at the counter next to us, with a ticket to Kununurra, but wanting to go to Broome. The duet grew more strident with each interchange. " I vish to go to Brrroome, ja!" "Yer ticket's for Kununurra" "But my husband he said the ticket it was for Brroome." "Well, it's for Kununurra" "But I must get to Brroome." "Yer ticket's fer Kununurra". The variation on the theme did not vary much. And was still going when we left for the comfort of the Frequent Fliers lounge.

Terry had the window seat so I could only catch occasional glimpses of the scenery passing by below. Amazing country at the Top End. Miles and miles of buggar all. Mud flats, with strips of water winding through them. Each full of salties - salt water crocodiles and nothing else.

And then the contrast of the Orde River Irrigation Scheme as we lowered into Kununurra. Enormous green fields, square and regular. All shades of green. Thousands of kilometres from the nearest market, there is about half a million acres under irrigation, growing chick peas, beans, mangoes, squash. All part of a grandiose political gesture aimed at opening up the north at a cost of millions.

The airport itself is an interesting experience. A large, overheated concrete box, reminiscent of a Third World airport. Red earth all around it gets tracked in. An enormous old air-conditioner grumbles and groans in the corner, circulating the air and cooling it marginally, but perhaps the fans do more to keep you cool than it does. Thank You For Being Patient, says the sign next to the strip of steel bridging the ditch between the airport building and the car park, where a nondescript Japanese vehicle, in a somewhat pre-used condition has a banner proclaiming that this is where you collect your Avis car. The airport is being up graded, presumably in response to deregulation of the airways. There is only one carrier in the Far North at present.

Frau Weber and her child have made it this far, but all passengers for Broome have to change aircraft here. She battles with the check in staff. Her conversation lost in the din of shrieking children of who are hurtling around the building and the general hubbub associated with the arrival and departure of the two flights which, today, justify the existence of Kununurra airport. It seems though that, unless there is is a no show, she and her child are destined to spend two more days in Kununurra - the next flight to Broome is on Thursday. She sits, disconsolate, on her substantial pile of luggage.

You would think that this far North and West, even though today is a cool day at about 38+, everyone would be wearing hats, but there are only two or three. A couple look like tourists in the wrong place at the wrong time. But the third! What a sight. An Aboriginal stockman, standing about 6' 5" in his high heeled boots and about six foot wide at the shoulder, silver buckled belt around his trim waist and a white straw stetson on his head, contrasting with the rich, deep blackness of his skin. The full blooded Aborigine has a blackness which is so different from the blackness of the Africans. Matt is the best description, I suppose. He looks a bit uneasy and it seems that he has never been on a commercial flight before - "Can I sit anywhere, mate," he rumbled when we came to board the plane. I showed him where his seat number was on his boarding pass and he studied it long and hard. I wondered how literate he was, but he found the right seat. As he went down the aisle, Terry said that he would hate to meet him on a dark night - I said that if he wasn't smiling you would never see him coming, his skin would absord all available light.

There is not much to do, once you have looked at the two relief maps which fill the northern wall. The showcase advertising local points of interest and crafts is fairly bare and badly in need of dusting and re-arranging - maybe they feel that there is no need to attend to this until the building works are completed. Mango masks are an advertised souvenir - bearded Pan faces leering at you, made out of half a mango pip. Just the thing to remind you of a long weekend - and any weekend would seem long, I guess, in Kununurra.