Memories of Jay Creek, Central Australia
Sunny days and warm sunshine seem too far away. The wind is biting, and the cold has chilled Central Australia. It is at times like these I remember the blessings of summer, highlights of the year’s calendar. A trip to Jay Creek comes to mind. Earlier this year, when it rained, we went in search of swelling waterholes in which to swim. The first visit was to the icy Ellery Creek, so welcome in the heat. We threw our belongings onto the sand and jumped into the bottomless water.
On the way back into Alice, we detoured
into Jay Creek. I had been to Jay Creek at night when a million stars
glittered overhead, and a campfire warmed my hands. I had been to Jay Creek in
the dry of summer when the sun beat down, and we stayed inside caravans. But I
had not been to the water at Jay Creek. For the first time, on this
rain-hunting voyage that had drawn us out of Alice, I was traveling with
people who had access to another part of this landscape.
The rocks rose out of the water towards the clear blue sky,
illuminated in the sunlight. There was no one else around. We dipped into the water
and let it wash away the sweat of the day. It was unusual to be swimming in an
isolated waterhole filled to the brim. Rain has been so rare over the past year, that many waterholes lost a significant volume of their water. La Nina rectified
this in the early months of 2021, even though it has dropped off now, and people
are back to longing for a storm.
That day, we swam. We enjoyed the setting,
and we enjoyed the water. There was a sense of getting out of Alice, even
though we were still relatively close – just down the highway. No buildings crowded
us in, no car engines hummed, no crushes of people had to be fought through to get
to our destination. It felt peaceful and what we saw was stunning.
Central Australia is a place overlaid with
memories. Some of them go back to a consciousness born at the beginning of
time. These stories are interwoven with the hills and the seasons and the red
dirt. I saw the smallest tip of beauty at Jay Creek that day. Beauty is more
than skin deep. It links through memory and story to the strength and
resilience of a place that has been both cherished and contested.
As I sit in the cold of winter, recalling
that my car’s temperature read 6 degrees this morning, I remember only what
I saw at Jay Creek that day: the water, the rocks, the sky. It warms me in a
way that the indoor heater in my room doesn’t. But I know full well that Jay Creek has a deeper meaning to many, and that I only saw a visible focal point. This land
has secrets it doesn’t share with everyone. I might draw comfort from that day
swimming in the sun and the fresh rain-flushed waterholes, but I know that my
thoughts are just one speck in a sky stretching back millennia.
Waterhole at Jay Creek