The Derby Heritage Trail, that we walked today, was very interesting. There are 29 interpretive panels along the 2.3km Heritage Trail and they give the reader an insight into the beginnings of the town of Derby. When William Dampier landed in King Sound in 1688 it would have seemed to him a very inhospitable place and it wasn't until Alexander Forrest made the first journey of overland exploration in 1879 and sent back glowing reports of the pastoral land and then the subsequent establishment of the port of Derby in 1880 that the area started to grow, albeit slowly. No doubt the early settlers would have been hampered by the isolation and rugged, inhospitable conditions.
Ask me anything about Derby and I can probably give you the answer 😂
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| The beautiful Kimberley Colourstone adorns many buildings in Derby |
The walk took us almost two hours but that included a couple of detours along the way to have a closer look at some silhouettes sitting on the mud flats. I really enjoyed the walk and feel I have a better understanding of the early history surrounding Derby. Modern day Derby is quite a nice town with a population of 3,325 with at least half being indigenous. I love the Main Street with its line of Boab Trees running up the centre and the wharf area is very interesting. It's a shame that they are working on the wharf and that we couldn't walk along it. We watched a Semi-Trailer unload its freight onto a waiting ship and then he had to back all the way off the curved wharf. That's no mean feat with the wharf being not much wider than the width of the truck.
The tides in Derby are remarkable and can reach up to 11.8m and are the second biggest tides in the world. We watched the tide come in today and it comes in at almost walking pace. Quite incredible. Apparently many people of have been caught with the rising tides!
This afternoon we drove the short 7km out of Derby to the Prison Boab Tree and Myall Bore with the longest trough in the world. They are situated close by each other. Apparently the 120 metre trough could water 500 bullocks at a time when the bore was still flowing. Since the bore stopped flowing, the water is pumped into the trough via a Windmill. It is still quite impressive.
The Boab Prison Tree is the second we have seen on our journey across the Kimberleys and each time I am a little haunted by the way the aboriginals were rounded up, chained together, made to walk up to 40 - 50km a day and then imprisoned for sometimes nothing more than stealing a beast for meat. Quite a few were rounded up for slave labour in the pearling industry. It's a shameful history. Sorry doesn't seem enough.
By the time we had finished reading the history surrounding the Boab Tree it was time to head back into town to watch another sunset. Be warned you will be seeing a lot of these photos while we are on the west coast 😜. Today has been a little cloudier than other days (no rain) so I knew that the sunset would be full of colour and I wasn't wrong. It was a gorgeous sunset and being at the wharf made it a perfect setting for sunset photos. Enjoy.
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