“We should call this road ‘Nimanjarra’!,” exclaimed Teddy Biljabu. He explained: “Very difficult, hard to get on with!” Teddy had just echoed everyone’s sentiments. And yet, we had only just mounted our 21st sandhill. We didn’t know there would be another 45 of the monsters, each up to 15 metres high, that would have to be traversed before we reached the plains approaching Punmu.

We were a party of ten who set out on a Monday in May to trek the terrain between Cotton Creek and Punmu to chart a new vehicle route for travellers between the two communities. An existing old, battered track was no longer sufficiently safe for most vehicles to undertake the journey. Identifying, planning and grading a new way between the communities would be safer, economically and environmentally sound and sensible.

If we were successful, our mission would eventually see the current travelling time and distance (which necessitates driving a very long way around the area encompassing the Telfer mine site) cut from 7.5 hours to about 2.5 hours, or about 325km to just over 120km. With us was East Pilbara Shire chief engineer Alec Douglas, who would plot every metre of our trek and, having seen the terrain first-hand, be sufficiently informed to guide the planning for a new, shorter, efficient and financiallyviable route.

Our journey began with four ‘combat-ready’ vehicles loaded to the hilt with ample fuel, food, camping gear, a satellite-based
navigation system and other communication aids, equipment and spare tyres. Three-and-ahalf days later, there was little left of anything, especially the tyres - we’d blown 16 of them by the time we pulled up in Punmu. But, during the course of our journey, we were blessed with some magnificent vistas and experiences. For Teddy and his crew, this was an opportunity to
re-visit lands, water holes and Sacred Places they knew only as children and which have since been left vacant for decades.

You could sense they thrived on their experience. At night, by campfire, they would chat and laugh then suddenly break into songs that meant significant things to them And, they could sing!For the rest of us, there were the even more unfamiliar sights and images of enormous expanses of dry lake beds, the ever-changing vegetation and landscape, wandering camels, paintings on sheltered rock faces, the stories told in the ‘songs’ Teddy and others recalled as we visited water holes, the sound of isolation, ‘roo hunting, cutting down ultra-thin trees for spears, and the setting alight to hundreds of acres of spinifex - “to regenerate life, bring back food, fruit, seeds and animals to this country.”

Development of the new road is subject to a successful application and approvals and funding from various government agencies. If and when the Nimanjarra Highway is shaped through these lands, chances are more Indigenous men and women will take the opportunity, too, to re-visit an old world full of inspiration. Finding Nimanjarra Highway - Nimanjarra Bryant (another difficult experience!)