Day 62: The Gulf Of Carpenteria

 

Looking at a map of Australia, you will see a big indentation in the north of the country. It's like someone took a giant chomp out of a cookie. That "bite" is the Gulf Of Carpentaria - another place in the world I knew nothing about until we took this trip. Last night, we sailed past Thursday Island, which is in the extreme northeast of Australia, by Cape York. That brings us to the Torres Strait, the gap between Papua New Guinea and Australia, before we reached the Arafura Sea. We are now sailing through the Arafura at the top of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Above, you see an old Dutch area map from the 1850s.

Geologists call the Gulf an Epicontinental Sea, which is a shallow sea that lies on top of a continent. The Gulf doesn't get much deeper than 200 feet and is shallower in many parts closer to the coast. The Gulf was dry land at the peak of the last ice age 18,000 years ago when the global sea level was around 350-400 feet (140m) below its present position. At that time, a large, shallow lake occupied the center of what is now the Gulf. It wasn't until 2004 that scientists discovered a massive submerged (100 feet down) coral reef province.

The initial discovery of the Gulf was a totally Dutch affair. In 1605, a Dutch expedition sailed partway down the eastern side before turning back. The Dutch returned for a further expedition in April/May 1623 and weren't too impressed with what they found. Not much happened until 1770, when Captain Cook sailed by the Gulf but didn't enter it. 

By 1802 it was apparent that Britain had a real interest in the north and that more knowledge about the coastlines was urgently needed. The opportunity to prosecute such examinations came in 1802 when Matthew Flinders, in the refitted "Investigator", set sail from Port Jackson with instructions to examine Torres Strait and the coasts of the Gulf of Carpentaria.

Thirty years pass. Matthew Flinders arrived in the Gulf waters on November 3rd, 1802, in the "Investigator." For the next two and a half months, he examined and chartered the Gulf Coast. While in the Gulf, Flinders blazed a tree on Sweers Island. It was 40 years before further exploration. (Sense a pattern here?) Then, Captain J. Lort Stokes in the "Beagle" spent the period between the 29th of June and the 4th of August 1841, retracing the Flinders route in more detail. Between July 30th and August 6th, Stokes discovered the Albert River and ascended it in a long boat, 50 river miles from the mouth. He was much impressed with the level grassy plains dotted with trees which stretched endlessly to the south, which he named "The Plains of Promise". Stokes also visited Sweers Island and on finding the tree blazed by Flinders, he blazed the reverse side.

The Brits finally got serious about the area in 1861, and for the next ten years, sent out a series of expeditions and eventually traders and settlers to fully claim the area. Even today, you still get the sense that this is a piece of the country that still bears a fee surprises and has more to offer than fish and some minerals.