"From our camp below the lip of the escarpment we scramble to the crest. A dry wind combs through the grass and rattles the palm fans overhead. A 100m inland from the escarpment stand tilted slabs of rock. Behind these rise two monumental formations, undercut on all sides so they appear on the skyline like the hulls of yachts perched on stone keels. We pick our way through the boulder scree into the shadows of the outcrops. The ledges under the overhangs are burnished smooth. In some of the pockets and crevices there are freshly weathered flakes of rock and a dusting of fine, white sand patterned with animal tracks. Along the underside of the overhang a black algal line marks where streaming stormwater finally falls free from the rock. Framed within this is a ceiling decorated with painted figures of small marsupials, cryptic shapes and unmistakable human forms.
The corridor between the two prominent outcrops is choked with tendrils and rock figs. We fight our way into the thicket, threading through spider webs and green-ant nests to climb to the flat summit. With the sun and wind on our backs we look out across the spreading plateau. In the foreground is an archipelago of stone islands in a sea of vines and spinifex. Beyond lies more of the same country, more bare bedrock eroded by the scouring wind and rain.
In the Kimberley such views are repeated at every turn. To observe geology on this scale is to face the paradox of a landscape that claims a longevity beyond belief , yet everywhere shows signs of relentless decay. Its history can be posited by isotopic dates and detailed in stone formations, shaped by the winds of aeons. But to the human eye the antiquity of the land is most evident in the plateau's oceanic spaces. The country can be imagined to be as old as it is vast."
