Day 59- Darwin

Stinky hot night. I think the low overnight was 25'. Crazy. And it's heading into winter. ?!?!? Another slow morning... did some washing and mopped the floors and had a bit of a tidy up. The kids played outside with Jordy dragging his tonka truck around the park and being a robot (in his beer carton box) and Darcy finding sticks and throwing big seed pod balls up and down the streets. I think we were still in the truck on the way into the city again before 10.

We are going to save most of the touristy things in here until our weekends off from work. But we'd head around and check out the cheap or free things to do. First stop was the WWII oil storage tunnels. They were dug by hand by over 400 retired men using only chisels and picks and shovels and just two pneumatic drills. It took them 16months and they were finished just as the war came to an end. I would imagine that even though they would have been glad the war was over i think that after putting so much of their time and heart into the tunnels they would have been sad to not have them used. After that we were going to stop at Survivors Lookout and Parliament House but we drove past the parking area and figured we'd just keep going someplace else instead. Plus Jordy wanted food. LOL! So we went to the Museum & Art Gallery of the Northern Territory.... actually, we went to the cafe out the back first. :) We got a table and sat down before we looked at the menu and, once again, ouch. A burger was $16 and a main was $25... Not to worry, and Jordy would have rioted if we tried to leave, so we had a nice lunch. And, for the first time since chistmas i had a yummy yummy iced coffee. I have to say that the hunt for decent coffee had been futile throughout the Territory but there are nice coffee joints all over the place in Darwin. And i have come to the conclusion that hot coffee is just not the way to go up here.

While we waited for lunch i went for a wander towards the beach to find a quick geocache. Task completed before the meals arrived. :)

Then off into the museum. And it was a fantastic setup. There was a room just for young kids with heaps of displays and bones they could feel and real stuffed animals and a couple of microscopes and fishtank displays and books and colouring in and jars of snakes and big turtles and building blocks and dress ups and if was pretty much adventure-central! Jordy was enthralled by the microscope and looked at the bugs and lizards for ages. It was a real fight to get him away from it. Darcy loved the animal puppets and crocodile tub.
After we finally convinced Jordy that we would come back again to the Discovery Room we got to head into the main museum. Lots and lots to see. The whole set up is great. Everything was really accessible and well set out and just really easy to get involved with. Even Darcy ran around and loved it squealing "dook" at everything and pushing buttons and getting really excited. We did not squeal so much but all the adults were impressed too. The section about Cyclone Tracy was especially good. We spent quite a bit of time in there (and called into the Discovery Room again as promised) and it was about 4pm before we got home. The kids fell asleep in the truck on the way back (i hate that!) so we waited for them to wake up before a swim to cool off again, although with some cloud cover it was not as hot today. Had a good chat with a few other couples travelling around or working in town for a few months.

Tim cooked meatloaf for dinner in the weber. After dinner the kids drew pictures for ages and we made a birthday card for Grandpa for tomorrow. Neither of them were tired and were happy to play until after 9pm when Tim and i had had enough and we put them to bed. I think i am now all caught up on the blog! and now i am off to bed as well.

Day 56- Katherine to Adelaide River

I'm a couple of days late with this entry so let's see if i can remember what we did!

While we were in Katherine we had a look at the map to see where we might want to stop next. It's not far from Katherine to Darwin but there was no reason to make it in one day when we could stop and have a look around. Plus we thought it would be good to call into Litchfield on the way past. There were a couple of options halfway between Katherine and Darwin, like the Douglas Hot Springs (although we were probably all hot-springed out), or Edith Falls (seen a few waterfalls) or the Douglas Daly region, or Adelaide River. So we had a look at what was in the area and where might have some kind of village so it might be possible to attend a dawn service and you would not believe it but we discovered that not only was Adelaide River the largest town in the area (population 350) it also has one of Australia's largest war cemetaries. Decision made.

On the way out of Katherine Tim had to fuel up and there was a geocache just down the road that we could not find when we both tried a few days earlier so Tim dropped me off and the time it took him to fuel up was the time i had to find it! LOL! I looked and looked and looked and sweated and looked some more but still could not find the darn thing. It's a micro so only the size of a 5c piece and buggered if i could figure out where it was hiding. Gave up and climbed in the truck for the shortish drive to Adelaide River.

The highway was road-kill central! You'd just get past the stink of one rotting carcase and there would be another. Lovely.

But Adelaide River looked nice. We had decided to stay at the showground and opted for an unpowered site cos it was just $10 a night and there was a breeze blowing and a bit of shade so the air con was not a big deal. There were quite a few other vans and tents there and we were told it would get busy cos the scouts were coming through later in the day. Set up camp nice and quick, had a snack and a drink and then jumped on our bikes to go for a ride around town (Mum and Dad drove!)

We headed over to the historic railway precinct (train museum) for a look around. Lots of old carriages and photos and stuff... and co-incidently another cache for us to find. They really area everywhere! We searched like crazy for this one and when we gave up and went back to the bikes we realised we had read the clues wrong so all four of us went back full of enthusiasm thinking it would be easy now with the clue and spent another half hour and still could not find it. But the kids got to see a huge train go past RIGHT in front of us and it blew its whistle so Jordy thought that was special.
On the bikes and down the highway with a brief stop to look for another cache. Once again we could not find a damn thing! Mugs game, this thing! Gave up and headed to the War Cemetary. Bit of a ride but worth it. Lovely park areas along the river and a really beautiful cemetary area. I was really glad that we went cos it would be impossible for me to attend the service in the morning cos of the kids and i wanted to pay my respects.

So much of the area up here has a lot of wartime history that i was just not aware of. There are several sites that were bombed by the Japanese in WWII (i had no idea just how much bombing they did in Australia!) and there are just heaps and heaps of monuments and buildings and airfields and bunkers and hospitals and EVERYTHING up here that have a huge wartime history. Actually, a lot of the small towns owe their existance solely to the war. But the post office at Adelaide River was bombed and nine civilians were killed and there are well over 400 military graves. We had a good wander through the cemetary and read the plaques for most of the graves. Then we went across to the park for the kids to have a wander. There were a heap of peacocks that were very accustomed to people and Darcy chased them all over. There was a tour bus that arrived while we were there full of backpackers doing a stop at the cemetary and one of the girls filmed Darcy chasing them (he did look funny pointing and 'dook'ing as he tried to run). We finally found a cache for the day- one for four is not great odds! Called into the pub on the way back. Busy little town. I think everyone is here for ANZAC day. Either that or the stuffed buffalo from Crocodile Dundee that's hanging in the bar. Quick beer cos the kids were getting hungry and we were all hot. Actually, the pub is a pretty decent van park too and really cheap.

Back to the showground and into the pool for a cool off. Jordy is swimming really well but i wish we were still doing lessons. He has started to swim nice and flat with his eyes down so we'll get him some goggles soon.

The day cooled off nicely and we cooked a simple dinner of sliced potato, sweet potato, and sausages and mushrooms on the weber. And they were right! It did get busy with the scouts. It was a nice atmosphere with lots of laughing kids and tents going up as the sun went down.

Day 54- Katherine

Jordy was up crazy early this morning. Lucky we all had to be up for our tour anyway cos he was knocking on Grandma and Grandpa's door before the sun was even up. We had our picnic packed and were all in the truck at 8 and on our way out to the gorge.

When we got to the helipad area Tim stayed back a little so that Jordy would not see the helicopter. Tim had already flown over the gorge before so he decided he would wait with the kids in at the park while Mum, Dad, and i did the tour, and we did not want Jordy to see what we were doing because he just loves planes and helicopters and would be upset if he saw us. BIG MISTAKE. I have to say that i am so, so, so disappointed that we did that cos we found out afterwards that he could have come and sat on my lap for free. I am still so disappointed now when i think about it because he would have loved it.

Anyway, no point having regrets and i think one of us will do another flight at Kakadu or somewhere just so he can have a turn as well.

The pilot was great and they were really generous with the flight. We were there early and were their first tour of the day so it was supposed to start at 9:00 but we were in the helicopter at about quarter to nine while he did his pre-flights and then in the air well before 9. We had paid for an eight gorge (12min) flight and added an 8minute extension to do a landing. But we did not get back until about 9:30.
The divisions between each of the gorges are not what i expected. I thought they might be divided by narrower openings in the rock or maybe by a waterfall or something but it is often just a shallow section of rapids or not much at all. From the air we could see little pools off to the sides and get a good appreciation for how high the water gets in flood time.

We landed on a little rocky outcrop at the tenth gorge and from there we could see the last three gorges. We had heaps of time to wander around and take lots of photos. I was absolutely busting to go to the toilet! LOL! And, unbelievably, the National Parks have not seen fit to build an amenities block up there amongst the rocks so i had to hold on for forever!
I tried to spot the truck parked down at the tour centre on the way back but could not see it. After we landed we headed into the visitors centre and had a look around (and went to the toilet!!). They have a nice display about the land around the gorge and it's history.

We had thought about doing a boat cruise as well but there is a 7am breakfast cruise where you can see the sun rise over the gorge and i think the colour in the rock and the stillness of the water would be amazing in the morning so we decided to leave it and see if we can get back this way and camp overnight at the gorge on one of our weekends off further in the season. The gorge is still closed to swimmers and canoes cos they have not finished their croc surveys and have found two salties in the gorge this year and i would love to go canoeing as well so even more of a reason to come back.

We had our picnic lunch down in the park and had a look at the gorge from ground level. Then we went for a bit of a wander to see if we could hunt down a geocache in the area. No luck! Too well hidden for us. But we managed to track one down closer to town on our way home.

We grabbed a couple of water li-lo things on the way through town and were home just after lunchtime. Sat around for a bit and then packed the kids in the bike caboose and rode over to the Low Level Nature park at the river. There is quite a flow to the river and it goes over a few small rapids. We have driven over it a few times and have been keen to get in there for a swim. The water was super nice and warmed just enough from the hotsprings upriver that it was beautiful to swim in. Lots of kids fishing up near the bridge too catching black bream and even the odd barra using cast nets.

Tim blew up the massive li-lo! and we took the kids floating down the river. Splashed around for quite a while riding down the current and walking back up to the bridge again.

Then we rode back to the park for a drink and some chips. Would have been lovely to have a beer but Katherine is a dry town and you can't have open bottles of alcohol away from home.
We saw a few FA-18s flying overhead and Jordy wanted to see more so we rode home and got changed and headed out to the airport. We managed to totally luck out and two fighter jets landed just as we arrived. Then one sat on the runway and blasted his engines for about a minute. It was crazy loud!! Incredible! Then it took off and was out of sight before you knew it.
Took the opportunity to hunt down another cache! LOL! Jordy found a gnome inside that he quite liked. Then we drove over to the other side of town to see the Ghan which was due to depart this afternoon. I was hoping to have a look inside the train but when we got there i think people were boarding so it must have been not far off leaving. Plus i will admit from the outside it did not look all that impressive. Not sure what i was expecting. Tim said "it's a train!? What did you think it would look like!?" I thought maybe flashier! ?? It did look nice though- as opposed to your regular Sydney commuter train. Nabbed ourselves another cache out near the station and then home for a quick dinner.

Tim made some great fritters. We had left over corned beef and he chopped up heaps of vegies and we told Jordy they were Dinner Pancakes. We made some dairy-free ones for Darcy and he just hoed in! And Jordy usually eats two mouthfuls for dinner and that's it (seriously) but he kept saying "How good are these!" and ate half nearly a full pancake. Miracle. We will be having Dinner Pancakes again in the near future.

I totally crashed at 8pm putting Darcy to bed. Tim fell asleep too putting Jordy to bed but he woke up later and then web-cam chatted to some friends from home and ended up staying up past midnight.

Day 53- Katherine

The van park here is in a nice location. It's just a little way out of the town centre but it's right near the Low Level Nature park and the river. There are more hot springs just up from here as well. It's a cruel joke really in my opinion. I mean, how nice would a 34'C tropical hot spring in Port Macquarie be!!! It'd be lovely of an evening or at this time of year just sitting back and relaxing. But instead there are these lovely hot springs out here where it's high 30ies all day and half the night and you can jump in and enjoy the water but then 5minutes later you need to go find some shade to stand in (or a cold shower) to cool off. But they have sprinklers going all the time at this van park too so we all just wander from sprinkler to sprinkler.

Did the washing nice and early, and the kids played outside for a bit. They took turns on the trike and collecting sticks. When Jordy is too lazy to peddle (which is most of the time) Tim pushes him on the trike with a 'poker' and so Jordy grabbed himself a poker and pushed Darcy all around the place. Darcy just sits and steers and somehow manages to balance with the wild pushing from behind.

Then went back into town this morning for a look around. We finally posted some postcards that we bought in Charters Towers! LOL! Bit slow (can we blame Australia Post?). Jordy worked his charm again and the lady mailed them for free?!?!

There are so many geocaches hidden in Katherine we had to try out luck at a few. Didn't do too badly and found 2 of the 3 we went hunting for. Jordy likes it and gets excited looking at the 'treasure'! hehehe

Spent the afternoon lazing around camp and swimming in the pool back at the van park. Met a lovely family that are travelling up to Darwin from QLD and we chatted to them for ages. I ended up having to get Darcy out of the pool cos he'd had enough. Jordy was too busy playing with the kids so he stayed with Mum and Dad and turned into a prune. An hour later they all wandered back to our van. Turns out the bloke is a marine mechanic! LOL! He had a look at the hole in the motor and apparently if you are going to have a hole in your motor then we picked the best spot for it and it should not be too much of an issue to fix. Corned silverside with white sauce again for dinner cos we loved it so much last time. I decided it was too hot to want to have the potatos boiling away in the van so i microwaved them, which i have done before when having sliced potatoes, but this time we mashed them afterwards. Big mistake. You can't mash microwave potatoes. Next time i'll just bump up the air con and boil the darn things.

Kids crashed at 7:30 tonight! Yay! Made sandwiches for tomorrow and we'll get an early night too. We have helicopter flights booked out at Katherine Gorge early tomorrow so i'm really looking forward to that.

Day 52- Mataranka to Katherine

The kids were both up early this morning and i could have slept for another month. Darcy had a horrible night and probably kept half the park awake. Must be something in the air cos this morning i could smell wattle all of a sudden and lots of pale pale brown frogs appeared from nowhere.

I trod on one that was trying to get into the caravan. Out, little man! Out! And then in the toilets one landed on my head and i had to flick at it to get it off. Tim asked if it freaked me out and yes, it actually really did! LOL!

Packed up and on the road well before 10. It's only a short drive to Katherine, a bit over 100km, and we wanted to stop at the Cutta Cutta caves on the way past. It's an area of limestone caves and rock and they are the NTs only cave system that is open to the public. There are actually two caves in the area (Tindal cave as well) and for the $15 entry fee i will admit i thought we might get to see both caves, or even get to explore further into the Cutta Cutta cave but you do get a good look through and it's quite interesting. Maybe we have been spoilt by the Jenolan Caves etc from closer to home. ?? But if you are watching the pennies then you are not missing out if you skip this one.

Jordy was pretty keen to see a bat in the caves but they were all hiding. He liked the bit where we had to duck and squeeze through the rocks to get through. Actually, Darcy liked that bit too and he lay right back and pointed and chattered away with his "dooh" noises and pointed up at the stalictites on the roof.

I remember the caves i have explored before all being nice and cool... well this one was hot! And we were all dripping with sweat. And i had forgotten to feed Darcy before we left the park this morning (shocking mother, i am!) and he got all grouchy so it was lucky it was a bit dark in there cos i had to do half the tour while feeding him (just in case he faded away to a shadow, poor starving thing.) Managed to score ourselves our second geocache (Dad found this one). And we got talking to another family on the tour that we have never met before that have read our blog! How cool is that :)

A short drive into Katherine and we did a bit of a scenic tour through the main street (and out over the bridge towards Darwin when i got a bit lost and then out over the other bridge towards the train station when i got a bit more lost!) Did not do much in the afternoon, I had a massive headache and was feeling a bit sick actually (forgot to drink enough water today) and as soon as the van was set up i had a lay down for a bit and drank a bucket load of water. Tim took Jordy for a swim in the pool and Mum and Dad looked after Darcy.

Jordy has had $4 in his Thomas the Tank Engine wallet since we left home and he has been wanting to buy a donut with it for ages! But not a whole lot of Donut Kings around the place. We mentioned a while back that maybe Katherine would have one and he remembered and had been waiting and waiting!! We had to head into town and get some groceries and Jordy was the first one out the door on his way to the donut shop. Unfortunately Donut King has not made it to Katherine yet so we had to settle for a packet of iced donuts from Woolworths. Jordy sat in the trolley and scoffed his (and then had another half of mine). We paid the price that afternoon cos while he seems to be fine on the Donut King ones these ones sent him stupid (like paddlepops and McDonalds thickshakes which are on the banned list!) So we had psycho sugar boy to deal with.

Cooked some butter chicken in the microwave and rice in the rice-cooker that was actually really tasty. The kids were both a struggle to get to bed and Tim and i pretty much flaked.

Sorry for the lack of photos from today but if you head to your local Woolworths and take a photo of any toddler being forcibly dragged off the car ride out the front then that was our afternoon!!

Day 51- Mataranka

For me this morning was rather uneventful; just a tidy up and some catching up on some forums and blogs etc and the kids watched a few nursery rhymes and Sesame Street songs on Utube.

For Tim the day was not quite as boring... he and Dad got up early to head down to the boat ramp and do some fishing in the main Roper River. Easy enough. They probably could have taken it as a warning to head back home and go back to sleep when they hit a wallaby. But i guess truck v's wallaby you can guess who is going to win so they kept going.

Now i don't have too many details cos people had the shits and it was not worth prying for information but i think the winch to get the boat off the truck had broken at some stage so they had to get it off by hand which is a bit of an effort. Dad ended up pulling a muscle or bruising his ribs or something (and this afternoon it is still very sore and he had a nap so it must have hurt). But they got the thing into the water. I have no idea how far they went but i think they got some fishing in and as expected caught nothing and had no bites and it's entirely possible that Tim (though i love him dearly) is the world's worse fisherman.

Anyway, in the river that is all nice and open and pretty much 6M deep right off the bank they managed to find the one submerged rock in the whole bloody river and put a hole in the gear box and stuffed the motor. From what Tim says the whole boat is stuffed and he's going to get rid of it.... Dad said we can get it fixed easy enough and these things happen. I'm guessing the truth is in between and we probably can fix it but it won't be cheap and i have no idea if the boat will appear on ebay sometime next week!

Oh, and they had taken the paddles out of the boat for some reason and i did not ask how they managed to get back to shore. I have created a whole new blog tag - the anti-highlights - in memory of today. Things did not get any worse but they did not get a whole lot better. A box that we have kept our shoes in on the truck must have gotten water in it at some stage and all the shoes have gone mouldy. That will require a bit of work to salvage the important pairs.

The kids had a good day though! How much fun is a sprinkler...





After lunch we gave the geocaching another go. I looked all over but Tim managed to find our very first cache. Signed the log, took a photo (that has to remain a secret) and put it back. Happy with the find we decided to try for another cache that is bigger and has swaps and trackables in it. So all in the truck and off we go. We searched in long grass in the heat getting scratched and sunburnt and covered in prickles for about 45min before we decided this geocaching is a fool's game and came back home.

Blog updates and dinner prepped. We are sooooo low on food! LOL! Sausages, mashed potato, and steamed carrots tonight. First thing we'll have to do in Katherine is grab some fresh fruit and vege and restock the basics.

After dinner Jordy wandered over to Grandpa to tell him that his eyes don't work in the dark and he needed a torch so he could go kill cane toads.

Day 50- Mataranka

yay! a lazy day with no travel. :) The kids were up early floating leaf-boats in the big plastic bath container.

Got the inevitable washing out of the road early and then went for a drive to have a look at the area. Went to the Elsey Station homestead replica that was made for when they filmed the movie, We of the Never Never. I assumed that the original Elsey Station was actually in Mataranka but it was over 20km away. Was good to walk through but nothing that i have not seen before.

Then walked along the trail through the odd mix of dry tropical forest to the Thermal Pool. It looked quite nice and less boring-concrete than i imagined. If we get a chance we might bring the kids back tomorrow for a swim while the men are fishing.

Not far from the thermal pool the two smaller rivers join up and there is a road with several day picnic areas and swimming spots and fishing areas so we went to see what the main river was like. And we wanted to try out Stevie's Hole which is a swimming spot in the river that is NOT warmed by mineral springs so we were hoping for a more refreshing swim (never happy!). But while we knew there was a 1.5km return botanic walk from the road i think the walk sounded more appealing when we were sitting inside the air conditioned caravan than it did once we were out in the heat. So we got to the entrance of the walk and read the tourist info sign and nodded and got back in the truck. :) Drove through some of the other day areas which were all quite nice and then had our picnic lunch down at 12Mile Yards. 12Mile Yards is an overnight camp area as well and is the other spot we had considered staying at while we were here. It would have been quite a nice cheap camp but the sandy soil is hot and it's all quite dry (no idea why cos there have sprinkers set up everywhere and with the bore mineral water they could run all day but...??) so i am glad we stayed at the park. After lunch we went for a walk down to the river. There are some swimming pontoons in the river and we found a little hot spring stream that run into it. You can really see how the calcium builds up on things and it has made a series of little waterfalls along the stream. We splashed between the cooler river, the warmer stream, and the in-between delta for an hour or more while Tim sat on the pontoons and had a fish (caught nothing).
Jordy and i collected a heap of shells in the stream and that kept him amused for ages! He'd find more and more and get excited and almost shout "Look! Look at this one!" As if the new one he had found was any different to the dozen identical ones we had already collected. hehehe.

Back to the van for the afternoon and i had a change to go online to check out Geocaching which is a sport that Tim and i had known about for a while but never had the time to look into. Not that we have a heck of a lot of free time at the moment! But we are doing things that make finding and placing caches more fun. And would you believe it but there are several caches in the area here!!!

I tried to use our car GPS to locate one and i rode my bike all over the area and looked all in and under things and walked myself stupid until the GPS gave me the shits! It's just not sensitive enough and it seems to think that if if has bought you to the end of the road for the location you entered then that is close enough but that won't work for Geocaching.

So back to the van and Dad dug his old handheld unit out for me. After a few false starts and reading a few more hints online i headed off on my bike again. It finally took me to the right location but it was getting too dark to search so i came back and made dinner instead. LOL! I'll try tomorrow.

Tim had been fishing over sunset and while the arsy kid in the boat was still pulling in barra, Tim caught nothing from the bank.

Pork and potato hotpot thingy in the microwave tonight and then a lazy evening. The town here is quite nice and the people really friendly. The local kids are all out splashing in the streams or fishing or riding their bikes or whatever and they all yell out a hello and wave with a big smile as you go past. It's nice!