John and the boys decided to paddle down the Ord River from below the dam wall at Lake Argyle. This is promoted as a two day paddle in the tourist blurb, but they plan to do it in 6-7 hours. That’s a Jacoby thing. We had an early start and drove up to the dam wall – about 70km. Being up there early made for the perfect light to see the enormous Lake Argyle.

Built to create an irrigation area in the Ord River Valley, Lake Argyle is 2000 sq. kilometres – Australia’s largest man-made lake. Apart from the farming it supports, there is also a huge recreation industry based around water sports, and the ever growing tourism industry.
I dropped the boys just near the small hydro electricity plant at the dam wall.


They took snacks and fruit, water, camera and a radio to tell me when to pick them up! The water flows quite well for the first 20km, past thick reedy banks and intermittent stands of pandanus palms. The river narrows down to about 10m wide in a few spots. They paddled through Carlton Gorge, with rocky cliffs and steep banks. By about the 25km mark the river starts to slow as the valley opens up. They stopped a couple of times for a snack and a rest, but never saw any crocs, much to the boys’ disappointment. There are only freshwater crocs around here (that’s what they say) which are quite safe. They paddled a total of 42km in 6 hours (including breaks) and I picked them up from a spot upstream of Kununurra before the flow of the river slowed right down and a head wind kicked in.

They had a great day on the water – and slept very well!
Back in Kununurra, John took me for a paddle in the Mango. This is a true statement, and Fergus and Harry can verify it. We paddled out of the lagoon to the Ord River proper, where I was quite certain the strong current of water would carry us away, downstream, leaving our boys to fend for themselves, out to the crocodile infested waters of the Timor Sea, never to be seen again. Turns out, the water barely moves at this point of the very wide river, and the rippling surface wasn’t the current – just the wind.
Oh – and they finished the paddle in 6 hours.