Growing up in landlocked middle England, swimming with sharks never featured on my bucket list. Yet here I am in the Kimberley wilderness, within arm’s reach of snub-nosed tawnys chomping blindly at barramundi chunks on the water’s surface. They’re on one side of the barrier, I’m on the other, keeping my fingers firmly to myself, in a pool-like enclosure on a floating pontoon.
It’s one of many unexpected moments from an overnight stay on Jetwave Pearl, the luxe houseboat of Journey Beyond and Horizontal Falls Seaplane Adventures. Reachable only by seaplane, it’s moored on the unfathomably azure waters of Talbot Bay, a stone’s throw from Horizontal Falls – hailed by a spellbound Sir David Attenborough as “one of the greatest natural wonders of the world”.
Or “Hozzy Falls”, as I hear it affectionately referred to by locals. It is a rare natural phenomenon where competing tidal currents surge through parallel gorges, creating rapids that pass horizontally.
Earlier that day, the sheer force of the water is a spectacle to behold, and to feel, as we zip through the ravines aboard a powerboat. Squeals abound as the vessel soars and drops amid the swirling whirlpools, and we’re peppered with saltwater.
Aboard a private charter on calmer, 30-metre-deep waters, I try my hand at fishing for golden snapper and orange spotted cod, another first for this Midlander. After a day in the great outdoors, we’re treated to local Tenderspot Meat Co eye fillet with Café de Paris butter and rosemary-salted potatoes aboard Jetwave Pearl, followed by a deconstructed coconut pavlova, a riff on the Australian staple by the onboard Naples-born chef, Francesco.
But perhaps the most outstanding of these experiences is the return seaplane transfer to Derby. Drinking in the sheer vastness of this ancient landscape from above is humbling, and as we make the 30-minute journey, I see it as a living, breathing being.
The vast, otherworldly mud flats adjacent to the falls are embroidered with the blooming patterns of creeks and mangroves, branching like veins and capillaries; the cracked rock faces are weathered skin; the red dirt the blood beneath. With headphones on, the ride has a feeling almost like being underwater, with an untapped world, usually observed only by nature itself, unfurling.
Colours of the Kimberley
Back down to earth, we board the minibus for our return to Broome, from which Horizontal Falls is a popular one-day or overnight jaunt. We’re hosted here at the beachside Cable Beach Club, an institution that was part of Lord McAlpine’s heavy tourist investment in the region in the 1970s.
It’s not long before we’re acquainted with the quirky personalities and flappy muzzles of the town’s camels: a fixture on Cable Beach since the ’80s. The image of the camel train, a single-file succession of the mammals led by a guide beside the Indian Ocean, is an iconic one, symbolic not only of Broome, but Australian tourism. It’s quite something to see it in person, en route in full lavender-and-tangerine-technicolour, the ethereal tones of sunset mirrored in the glassy reflections on the sand.
These knobbly-kneed, musky-smelling creatures are a legacy of Australia’s cameleer history and settlers in the region, of which there have been masses. In the late 1800s, the golden age of Broome’s pearling industry, thousands of divers, boaters and deckhands flocked to the town in search of wealth and opportunity, from Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. This resulted in a blended community that is uniquely diverse to this day; the rickety tin-roofed buildings of Chinatown remain where once, as legend has it, there were opium dens and brothels.
On an insightful Broome & Around tour, we visit Cygnet Bay Pearls, the showroom of Australia’s oldest, family-run cultured pearl farm. A weathered, ocean-crusted oyster shell is prized open before us, the iridescent gem daintily plucked from its fleshy cocoon. So embedded is Broome’s pearling legacy that even the nearby Moontide Distillery uses this oyster mantle in its Pearlers Gin blend.
Another popular local tipple for counteracting the heat is Matso’s thirst-quenching ginger beer. Said to be Australia’s first alcoholic iteration, it’s served with humour at this artsy brewery (ask what its combination of ginger and mango beer is called, if you’re not easily offended).
At Spinifex Brewing Co, tank-to-tap beer and woodfired pizzas loaded with plump prawns are shared by moonlight behind Cable Beach. Its hospitality is even enjoyed by the camels, who pass by for a carrot over the fence come afternoon.
After a whirlwind few days, what will remain imprinted on my mind – and heart – is the kaleidoscopic colours of the Kimberley, from the red earth, cerulean waters and white sands of Broome to the Eden-like ranges of the Falls. After all, it will forever be the setting for my shark story to scare the English folk back home.
This feature was originally published in Issue 13 of Dream by Luxury Escapes.
Discover Western Australia
Feature image: Tourism Western Australia.
