We had a coffee and a pie at Bamaga bake house. We were second in line at the drive through then we hit the road towards the Jardine ferry. We arrived on the north side around 12:30ish to find the ferry operator had gone to lunch so we hung around chatting to others waiting for the ferry.
We got across around 1:30pm and headed towards the Vrilya point rd. It's not marked so it was lucky we had the hema map and gps. The first obstacle was a log bridge over crystal creek. This is about 4km from the start of the track. It had a sharp right turn just after the bridge and the car that went through just before we arrived made it look tricky. I got out to film and Gaz just breezed across and around. The water in the creek was the clearest I've seen so far, we might stop for a dip on the way out.
There were no other obstacles until we got to the beach. You drive for about another 25km. The roads/tracks tend to split and go off in all kind of directions. The track is quite corrugated well used but not maintained. We got to the first main intersection and kept going straight ahead until we came to the top of a long steep bumpy decent. It looked like the trailer may have difficulty getting back out so we backed up and went along the south track. This track also tends to break off in different directions but basically you follow it for about 3km until you get to a creek that is following along side the track. Cross the creek to get across to the beach. We took the second crossing.
Once we got to the beach we saw a few camps set up on the beach front. The had some good spots near trees for shade. We got our and had a look around. We spoke with some other people looking for a spot who had been told that people had tried to go further along the beach and got bogged in the soft sand.
We let the pressure in the tyres down to 18 and tried to drive further along the beach. No good - we got bogged. We got the maxtrax out and they worked well but only for a metre or so until we got bogged again. Luckily another couple were driving along the beach and helped us our by giving us a bit of a tow.
So we head back north along the beach and got bogged again. This was just not fun. We used the maxtrax a few times but it was hot and sticky and the sand was just so soft and the beach was littered with rubbish. All of the decent sites seemed to have been taken and the flies! They just hung around, catching a lift, buzzing in your face. We were getting cranky at each other and Sam was getting annoying. We could have quite easily just turned around and just gotten out of there except we were stuck in the Bl@@dy sand!
Another group came to our rescue and brought their toyota over to a spot on the sand to act as a winch point, they then helped Gaz winch the car out.
We drove off the beach and into the dunes a little where we ended up setting up camp. We still had a beach view and the stars at night time were amazing but I think getting stuck out a downer on our Vrilya point experience and the fact that we couldn't even go for a swim in the sea or nearby creek made our minds up that we would keep going the next day rather than spend a couple of nights there. We decided we'd rather head back to Elliot falls or one of the bush camps near there and go for a swim in the freshwater creeks.
We had a late dinner that night char grilled chicken drumsticks and rice. Sam had noodles and cucumber - thank goodness for cucumber!
Oh and Mum if you are reading, check out the photo of Sam with his sticker book while he's sitting on the turtle. He likes to have something to read/do whilst going to the loo!
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