Today we walked sixteen kilometres through Ant Dreaming country led by lead Walkatjurra Head Ranger, Gudathada (Zach), and Nathan, proudly carrying the Aboriginal flag. We walked along a beautiful red dirt road through land which overlaps with the other songlines of the Seven Sisters, Carpet Snake and Dragonfly.
On the way Zach pointed out trees and told bush medicine stories, the most memorable being of a lizard with medicine stronger than morphine if you cut off and swallow its head. We also leant how to find nutritious bush nuts and smelt precious sandalwood from one of the few remaining trees. The kids had fun learning some words in the sign language common to the Western Desert like, “what’s up?” and “kangaroo.”
On our last break before rejoining the Goldfields Highway two kilometres from camp we read the latest media reports on BHP Billiton’s sale of Yeelirrie to Cameco in The Western Australian http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/business/a/-/news/14727454/no-urgency-for-yeelirrie-cameco/ and The Kalgoorlie Miner. There was also a nice picture of us in The Kalgoorlie Miner on page 3.
Back at camp we rejoined the elders and camp setup crew waiting patiently in the shade, gratefully sipping our hot tea and coffee that was ready and waiting. The rest of the day is spent lazing around, talking, playing and working on various camp jobs while the sun slowly tracks across the huge expanse of sky to disappear back into this magical red earth.
Best wishes always