Gallery Bay

From the Berkeley River, the next destination that most visitors choose when heading out into the Kimberley is Koolama Bay at the mouth of the King George River. We left the Berkeley at dawn with a big spring tide to get us out the direct channel to the NE, but we weren’t heading for Koolama Bay.

There is a little bay known as Gallery Bay (link opens Google Maps), just short of Koolama that is recommended for it’s excellent art and water, but it is quite exposed and requires calm conditions to be able to access it by yacht. The art is found up the little creek at the west of the bay (left hand of satellite image).

When we left the Berkeley, we had a typical dry season forecast for this part of the coast, with an early SW land breeze becoming an afternoon SE sea breeze, but with a trough passing through southern Australia, the next couple of days were forecast to be light and variable winds only, so we had a plan to be able to access Gallery Bay. From the Berkeley we headed for Seaplane Bay, just a few miles before Gallery Bay, and with the afternoon wind around to the SE, and being familiar with the anchorage (having been here last year) we were able to sail up to anchor. The next morning we had a light offshore zephyr before sunrise and an ebb tide to carry us the few miles to Gallery Bay, but even our spinnaker could not get us there as the wind dropped to glass as soon as we were clear of Seaplane Bay.

Seaplane Bay is named this because of the events of 1932, when German aviators Bertram and Klausmann landed here when their seaplane ran into a storm and became lost, and landed safely when short of fuel on the leg from Timor to Darwin as part of their round the world flight. But they were really lost, thinking they were close to Darwin, and after months with little food and water were finally rescued by local Aborigines. There is nothing to see here anymore, but the story makes for interesting reading.

So our arrival at Gallery Bay was under motor rather than sail, but we had used as little as possible making the most of the available weather and geography to get as close as possible before burning as little as possible of our valuable fuel. What we found here made all that effort worthwhile. There is a little creek that runs down into the corner of the bay, and the deep ravine that the creek runs down is lines=d with caves and rock overhangs that must have once supported a large population of Indigenous people. The abundant food that we found for ourselves was also documented in the art that is painted onto the sheer walls of the ravine. The clear fresh water of drinking quality runs down through water falls over smooth rock pools surrounded by lush vegetation.

We found Gallery Bay a little oasis in the middle of dry tablelands of the East Kimberley, and were rewarded with weather suitable to stay overnight before heading on.