From Casuarina Creek, we headed up the gorge of the Berkeley, stopping first at a reach at the start of the gorge to explore a side creek. We left at first light, drifting on the tide in glassy calm conditions, with fog forming in the warm moist sea air above the cold water of the lower reaches of the river.
We stopped and fished the creeks and beaches out of our dinghy, using just the little electric motor. With heaps of solar panels and the knowledge of months worth of cloudless blue skies to come we have bought a little 500 watt electric outboard to serve as an auxiliary in case of main engine failure and to extend the range of our petrol.
While moving slowly along this reach of the river, idling along fishing, we were rewarded with the viewing of different marine life and birds nesting along the cliffs of the gorge, and waterfalls falling down side creeks into the river. We anchored here again on the way downstream, and were greeted by a large crocodile lounging on the beach where we had been fishing a few days earlier.
Upstream from here the river narrows into a tight gorge. In places it narrows to a little more than 100m, measured from the satellite image I display on my rugged computer.
We used the tide to assist us, going both ways, in order to minimise our fuel burn and preserve it for later
From here we explored by dinghy, checking the rock bar at the tidal limit of the river, the last creek that we enjoyed so much last year, and another amphitheater that runs in to the top of the gorge.
Evidence of the floods that came with Cyclone Fina are obvious, with debris and sediment high up the wall of the gorge, and noticeably higher, the further upstream we moved. Fig trees emerge from the rock cliff in places that defy nature.
At the last creek, it appears that the flood water that came down with Cyclone Fina must have been something like 30m deep, completely filling the creek gorge and spilling over the plains around. It is beyond comprehension how much water must have come down the river, which must have been throttled back by restriction of the gorge further downstream. We found evidence of flooding on the top of hills beside the creek, suggesting that the whole landscape was under water.
We anchored in the gorge and at a three other locations on the way back down the river to the ocean.
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