Night Well and an Amazing View

We had a bit of a late start this morning, as our schedule today seemed to operate on “Noongar time.” After Eugene arrived with two elders, Auntie Winnie and Auntie Mary, we set off for a day of touring a number of sacred sites.

Our first two stops were at Noongar burial sites – one marked only by plants and protective posts, and the other commemorated by statues and flowers. It is said that you can learn the most about a culture by how they handle the dead, so in that vein, these were very important stops. Eugene shared that there is a particular plant that is planted at a grave site, so that Noongars walking through the bush will know it is a grave and will take care, making sure it is kept up and not disturbed. While, he shared, it is a family obligation to maintain the graves of deceased family members, it is also the responsibility of all Noongars to care for any grave they come across and ensure that it is properly maintained and honored.

In this sense, it was very important to see the grave sites, however I found today to be particularly challenging as we visited a number of sites, but the importance of some was more obvious than others. For example, a grave is a very important, sacred site in Noongar culture, but from my wadjella eyes, at first all I could see was a plant in the bush. It was unlike visiting, for example, the woman’s place yesterday, in which you could tell how important a place was just by looking. Each time the bus stopped, it became a mental challenge to get off and be fully open about the place we were visiting. I want to be as open as possible to this experience, but I struggled a bit today in accepting the importance to an otherwise seemingly meaningless piece of land to which I have no attachment whatsoever. An important battle, yes, but still a fight with which I was faced.

After we saw the second grave site, we walked a few hundred yards to Night Well. Alongside a salt river, Night Well was a remarkable fresh water pool that vanished during the day and refilled itself at night. Many Noongar families would camp at the site, as there was a consistent supply of fresh water, as well as animals which came to drink at the well. In the first few decades of the twentieth century, though, a wadjella man was contracted to dynamite the well – which he did – and has resulted in a complete change of the well’s pattern of flow. Instead of the rushing of water which used to occur naturally, there is now just a small trickle. Eugene shared that geologists are currently consulting on how to possibly restore the Night Well without salinating the reserve of water, a very interesting prospect from a cultural preservation perspective.

Additionally, Auntie Winnie shared her personal story with us as we sat on boulders around Night Well. Her family had camped at this spot when she was a girl, and she had memories of her mother collecting the water, as well as other stories of how her parents earned a living by trapping and how she avoided being forcibly removed due to an illness.

After listening to Auntie Winnie’s story, Eugene took our group to do some informal cultural mapping at the site. Though found artifacts are normally measured and documented by GPS, we practiced looking for remnants of Noongar culture. Chipped stones and flint heads, as well as out of place rocks are excellent indicators of travel and trading, and are therefore looked for. To be honest, my eyes were not top notch at spotting the artifacts, although I was very skilled at spotting roo poop. I also found a very cool, more recent artifact – a broken bottle which had melted in a recent bush fire. (Unlike in the U.S. where forest fires are often viewed poorly, bush fires are often natural measures of control and seen, especially when controlled, as necessary for the environment.)

After Night Well we left and went to an area of land at Gnowanup that is being reforested. At the Noongar meeting place that was recently installed there, a number of different people explained the reforestation process and the collaborative efforts between the Department of Resource Management, the Nature Conservancy, local farmers, and others. The talk was actually incredibly interesting, but unfortunately the weather was very windy and chilly. Sitting still with a cool wind whipping through our jackets was very difficult, and when we finally broke for lunch the change wasn’t unwelcome!

We all ate together at the DRM shed a few kilometers up the road. While I’m at a physical breaking point as far as sausage is concerned, Cheryl made a lot of delicious bread and we had damper from yesterday, as well! While I greatly appreciate that we have had our meals prepared for us, I am actually looking forward to going home and cooking and controlling my diet on my own. It is weird to relinquish such control, and almost offers and uneasy feeling, even though we have been fed with such care.

After the late lunch, we left for our last site of the day – a lookout at Mount Trio in the Stirlings. We stopped on the way to look at the oldest sandalwood tree in the area which is about 140 years old, but then got back on the bus and continued to Mount Trio. I fell asleep on the way and as I woke up and stumbled off the bus, we were suddenly facing a huge rock. As the people in front of me gradually climbed up the rock, I realized that we were going all the way up to watch the sunset. Though not a difficult climb, it looked challenging initially; we first had to climb up about twelve feet to a ledge, then follow the ledge up to a small cave and wiggle up through an opening in the roof of the cave to the top. Once up there, the site was incredible, although we missed the sunset by the time everyone got up there. When they gave the call to begin to climb down I was the first to volunteer as I didn’t want to get stuck up there in the dark, so I got to pave the way on the downward trek, which was actually quite easy. Overall a very cool, though somewhat frightening experience.

We had dinner back at the retreat and then everyone went back to the cabins to pack and get ready for bed, as we are leaving tomorrow for Albany. This time in the Stirlings has been very incredible, although I am excited to be in a more civilized area again!

Peace,
Jill