We were completely unprepared for the magnificence of the gallery suddenly revealed. A shiver ran up my spine as I saw for the first time the great white Wandjina spirit figures, two and three times larger than human scale.' So begins Tim Bowden's fascination with rarely seen Aboriginal rock art, a major theme in this most recent book detailing the Bowdens' continuing love affair with Australia. On their latest journey Tim and Ros Bowden explore the Kimberley by land and sea, where dramatic twelve-metre tides guard coastal locations unchanged by time - still as 17th century buccaneer William Dampier first described them. For three months, Tim and Ros and their trusty four-wheel-drive, Penelope, travelled from the improbably sculptured Bungle Bungles to the Pilbara and the wildflower-filled Mid West. Bowden's enthusiasm for history is infectious and this book is peppered with great stories of present and past, ill-fated settlements and expeditions, tragic tourist deaths and the grandeur of Australia's intriguing, spectacular north-west.

Autorentext
Tim Bowden is an acclaimed oral historian, broadcaster, and radio and television documentary maker who for many years, as host of 'Backchat', was known as the voice of the ABC. He is the author of seven books including Penelope Goes West, The Way My Father Tells It: The Story of an Australian Life, The Silence Calling: Australians in Antarctica, Antarctica and Back in Sixty Days, and One Crowded Hour: Neil Davis, Combat Cameraman.

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AcknowledgementsIntroductionMap1 Assignation with Alice2 Tackling the Tanami3 Cruising with ancient mariners4 Kimberley kaleidoscope5 Into the Bungle Bungles6 The Bradshaws7 You can't drink tea through a fly veil8 Engorged9 Blown away10 Wildflowers and wild placesBibliography