Trekkin

Today we woke to sunshine but cold.  The nights get down to about 6C degrees and the days are around 16C degrees.  We had to go into town to buy a few things (& we bought a few things we don’t need).  It is a public holiday today, Territory Picnic Day.  We were very lucky the Electoral Office was open, but not lucky enough, we couldn’t vote – we filled out request for postal voting forms & they promised to send relevant forms for postal voting to Kununurra Post Office.  It has been a fairly ordinary day but we wandered around Alice Springs and discovered places we haven’t seen, like a lovely park in the middle of town and some more lovely art galleries.

The excitement for the day was when our friends Sue & John arrived this afternoon with their (still white) brand new Vista caravan – very nice.  We had dinner together & then we went to a 4WD information night, the caravan park special – it was very interesting.  It also made up our minds to go through the Tanami Desert (even though it has been wet & maybe we shouldn’t) instead of going the long way around, because we met a couple who just crossed it coming from the opposite direction and they reckon it is rough but o.k. 

We are staying in Alice Springs for another day, we have to do some business and our friends had a few days of hard driving & they need a rest, to buy a few things & have some time to sort things out in their new caravan.

It’s Sunday, pancake breakfast – what a crowd, they make good pancakes all on the back of a trailer.  We all got a name tag with our first name and city we come from so that we could socialise (this would be good in the suburbs at home too).  While we enjoyed our breakfast the caravan park’s washing machine did all our washing.

The day is overcast and cool.  By 10.45 we were on the road to explore the eastern MacDonnell Ranges.  Ron made sure that we were heading the opposite way from the shops. To see some more gaps & gorges – big rocks – until you get there & then it is WOW.  We are so insignificant when you look at these enormous rock formations, they have been there over 800 million years ago – we are not even a grain of sand. It is so rugged & beautiful, I wanted to capture it all but photos can’t do it justice.  Our first stop was to Emily’s Gap it was lovely but we would have had to cross a deep water hole (we didn’t have our swimmers and too many others around to take it all off).

The next stop was at Jessie’s Gap with a short walk to a piece of rock art.  A flock of budgerigars were very noisy & the first we have seen on the trip.  Corroboree Rock was next on the agenda, a rock formation that is unusual in that it is standing alone.  A nice walk around the base of it & a look at all the wildflowers in bloom.

Trephina Gorge was a lot more substantial and involved a walk of a few hundred metres on a sandy creek bed plus off with the shoes & through the shallow running water to get to the next part of the walk on the ridge on the other side of Trephina Creek.  As we climbed the ridge line at the side of the creek the views got better & better, plus a changing variety of wildflowers that we hadn’t seen before.  The views form the top of the gorge were absolutely amazing, the photos don’t even come close to doing it justice.  The river red gums were battered & bruised from recent flooding but they still looked stunning.  On the way out we stopped & had a look at the largest ghost gum in the East MacDonnell Ranges & it was stark white & looked very pretty in the sunshine with the backdrop of the ochre red ranges behind.  We then took a detour down the high clearance 4WD only track to John Hayes Waterhole, it was definitely high clearance 4WD & very slow going in parts, driving along creek beds, up the banks, over rocks, it had it all.

After that little escapade we hit the bitumen again & headed down to Ross River Resort & the turnoff to N’Dhala Gorge Nature Park.  The road was closed  into N’Dhala Gorge after the recent rain so we satisfied ourselves with crossing the vast sandy expanse of the dry Ross River which had very recently been graded & had all of the sand cleaned off the road.  Back to Alice Springs & the East MacDonnell Ranges took on a whole new perspective driving through them from a different direction.

The highlight of today’s trip was finding some Sturt’s Desert Pea in full flower.

Last night the rain stopped & we woke to a nice but cold day, the highest it got to was 16C degrees. I decided that I desperately needed shopping therapy so we headed into town.  We visited the big MBantua Fine Art & Cultural Museum, so many lovely things in there. After I made sure that we helped Alice Spring’s economy I could only window shop (there are so many Aboriginal Art shops). Alice Spring is the only place I’ve been to in Australia where they charge 50 cents to use the public toilets & that they actually have someone sitting there collecting (that’s an initiative for employment).

Alice Springs certainly has grown into a modern big city since 2002, our last visit here. The Todd River is still dry & red sand and rocks.  In the Northern Territory they have a strict “no alcohol in public places”, there is no more social gathering in the dry riverbed & drinking all day.  They have really cleaned up the town.

Unfortunately we had to go to Woolworths to stock up on the groceries – now Ron has found out what I have to suffer through on a regular basis & where all his hard earned money goes to.

Back from shopping & we decided to climb the MacDonnell range at the back of the caravan park.  We got a fair way up before the weather started to close in & rain threatened so we decided that discretion was the better part of valour & headed back down before we got caught in a rainstorm on the mountain.  The views from up there are spectacular, these ranges are majestic & the plant life is prolific, with everything in flower after so much rain.  It really is pretty, as well as a very rugged beauty with the gnarled trees struggling for a foothold amongst the rocks on the mountainside.  I accidentally stood on a red ant nest (who would do that deliberately) & ended up with ants in the pants while on the mountain & didn’t notice them until they started biting, by that time I had about a hundred on me, thankfully not all inside the jeans, most on the outside & on the top of the boots.

Back for the afternoon cheese & bikkies plus a warming coffee (not a red, that will be tonight). That’s why he hurried down the mountains not because of the weather!

When in mobile range it’s so good to catch up with friends & relatives, it gets a bit lonesome out here in the Never Never.

We left Taylor’s Creek about 10 am, it was 22C degrees.  The landscape changed the further we went, it got greener.  The shrubs are mainly low growing & a lot of them are in bloom – they are looking good. Plants grow well in the desert if there is water. The closer we got to Alice Springs the darker the clouds looked and finally it started to bucket down. We planned to stop before Alice Springs but not under these conditions.  The rest areas were all churned up gluggy red mud.  The only civilisation between Tennant Creek & Alice Springs is a few refuelling stations (like Big Man Walking) plus some turn-offs into some aboriginal settlements – it is a big empty red (green) centre. As we crossed the Tropic of Capricorn the photo opportunity was missed out because of the rain & the mud.  The temperature dropped to 18 degrees as we travelled through the rain, yesterday it was 33, a huge change.

After 336kms we arrived in a wet Alice Springs & the Todd River still isn’t flowing. We booked into the Big 4, MacDonnell Range Holiday Park – more like a city.  It is huge, we got a street map.  It has everything, big entertainment areas for the kids, several BBQ & community kitchens & bathroom facilities (they were the ones we really appreciated the most and I mean most, like an enormously long hot shower).  They have free activities like didgeridoo show, slide shows, star talk, 4WD presentation, Sunday pancake breakfast etc. This must be a Rolls Royce of a caravan park.  (Give me the simple life down by the Gregory River any time).   They also have the magnificent backdrop of the MacDonnell Range just behind us & it looks magnificent.

We had a hot & spicy pizza for dinner from the local Pizzeria.

All this rain isn’t looking good for crossing the Tanami Desert when our friends John & Sue arrive on Monday.

A late start this morning for some reason, perhaps a restless hot night (or just getting used to this easy life style).  It was so hot last night we spent most of the night without the cover, not at all like Canberra at the moment.

One interesting observation is that the vast majority of traffic on the road is grey nomads.  Just outside of Tennant Creek we visited the Old Telegraph Station, Ron enjoyed that (he may have left work for 3 months but telecommunication hasn’t left him). We refuelled at Tennant Creek BP & bought some lunch at an uninspiring transit stop.  It must have been payday for our indigenous friends as Tennant Creek was swarming with people shopping & socialising.  It was sad to see so many young teenagers roaming around instead of being in school.

An aboriginal family (baby and 3 more children) stood next to a broken down car or it ran out of petrol about 20 km from Tennant Creek, Ron immediately stopped to help them, the man came across the road and all he wanted was water, we always have a few bottles in the car so that was easy.

Our next stop was the Devil’s Marbles, it is unbelievable there is nothing and suddenly huge rocks appear.   Very interesting granite rock formations just off the highway, it’s amazing the balancing of these huge rocks & the way they have weathered.  It was a pleasant 33C while we were strolling amongst the rocks and having some fun (I was a bit worried about Ron though) we met a skinny dingo that was looking for a feed (didn’t get any from us).  Our next brief stop was Whycliffe Springs (it is famous for Alien sightings) where I filled our petrol container for the generator as I had forgotten in Tennant Creek (he just wanted to stop to see the Aliens).  A bit further on we pulled into Taylor’s Creek rest area after 355km for the day, some more fruit cake, a chat to our new neighbours from Tasmania & another glorious sunset.

Another early start to the day with a walk half an hour before sunrise down to the end of the Camooweal billabong & the old road bridge, again lovely as the birds woke up & started about their day.  We had a late breakfast by the time we got back from the walk & then it was pack up time.  We chatted to our neighbours for a fair while & they were keen to see the Karavan retract & pack down to size. We had a very warm farewell from our new friends (we only met them the day before). The next stop was the Camooweal Drovers Camp, which is a museum run by volunteer old drovers, very well done with a little bit of work to do yet.  We met the lady who did a fantastic mural outside the museum & painting  an even better mural inside, a lot of drovers sat for her, those portraits are just unreal, she deserves to wear the artists beret.  Jeff Simpson, an old drover, showed us around & explained all the bits & pieces.  Tereza took the opportunity to have a ride of the famous bucking bull, Murranji, to my surprise she stayed on, the crowd cheered and she lasted to the bell.

We took the opportunity to use the town dump point & while filling with water another Kimberley Karavan pulled in next to us.  We chatted for around an hour, exchanged different camp site information, places to see & to go, also discussed some of the differences we had between our Karavans.  A bite of lunch (only 2 places to eat, the pub or the road house – we were not adventurous enough for the pub) they have a Centrelink Office, the Post office is the grocery store as well ( it is a good idea all post offices should sell groceries, they are selling everything else) the museum and not much else. Then on the road again and it was just 2 pm as we crossed from Queensland over the imaginary boarder to the Northern Territory and there it was only 1.30 pm in the Northern Territory.  Another noticeable change, the speed limit is 130.  The roadside scenery changed as we moved further into the Northern Territory, the ground became richer red colour & the low shrubs greener.  322kms later we pulled into the Frewena rest area on the Barkly Highway about half an hour before sunset. Coffee, fruit cake, cheese & a nice walk, then we enjoyed a beautiful outback sunset with an old Southern Cross windmill as a backdrop.

The cacophony of the birds woke us and the sun too, the screeching of hundreds of little corellas, the throaty booming of the brolgas – did we wake in paradise?   We witnessed a beautiful sun rise, a lovely moon set and myriads of bird life.  This place is a bird watchers paradise.  Our gorgeous grandsons would go crazy here – they both love birds so much I wish we could share it with them.

We went for a walk and then under the shade of a Coolabah tree, camped by a Billabong (waiting for the billie to boil), watching the birds we had bacon & eggs for breakfast.  We sat around bird watching most of the day, black kites, whistling kites, nankeen kestrels, even an osprey that grabbed a fish not 20 metres away from where we sat.  There are two families of 4 brolgas in the billabong, one family at each end, pied cormorants & a flock of around 100 little black cormorants, some stately pelicans and some elegant egrets, including 2 great egrets.  The list goes on, the variety of bird species here is amazing, there are bird nests in nearly every tree lining the billabong.

We had another long walk in the afternoon. We walked the entire length of the billabong, collecting a few feathers for my hat along the way (as if he needs any more, he has enough stuck in his hat to take off).  This afternoon the people that pulled up to camp next to us for the night, we met & chatted with at the O’Shannassy River crossing on the road from Riversleigh Station, what a small world.

We have a most wonderful full moon reflecting on the water, it’s almost light like at day time.  We had dinner outside, it is a beautiful 25C degrees with a light wind off the billabong.

There is always something to spoil things like paying bills on line – they even catch up with you in paradise.

First thing this morning I whipped up another damper – not because I am so good but because we haven’t got any bread.  The embers from last night’s fire were still hot so while we went for our walk  the damper cooked perfectly this time.  One more swim.  We are packing up and going – no prolonging the inevitable.  Wish we could take this place home.

Off to Camooweal – all on dirt road. The tire pressure is let down, car front to 26, back 30 and the Karavan to 25.  The scenery keeps changing from grassland to beautiful grey low growing eucalypts & lovely white trunked trees, termite mounds then back to grass and scrub land.  All the time surrounded in the distance by blue hills.  The road is corrugated, dusty, winding & lots of big dips but not as bad as we expected it.  We almost missed the turn off to Riversleigh, a world heritage listed are (declared in 1994) of major fossil deposits dating back to 25 million years.  The only publicly accessible D site takes you up a steep hill – all along the path you see limestone with the fossilised remains of ancient animals, birds & mammals.  There was one really special big one of the thigh bone & gizzard stones from a Thunderbird which was about 2 ½ metres tall.  Very interesting, you wonder who on earth wandered around in the middle of nowhere to find all this.  The surrounding hills were filled with limestone formations that looked like very well made dry stone walls – another amazing sight.

After 330 km. of dirt road (we saw 7 cars in total, none at all in the last 200km) we arrived, very dusty at Camooweal at 6.30 pm – refuelled the car & us at the BP Road House.  Back in mobile phone range – good to catch up with the family. It was dark by the time we got to the Camooweal Billabong camp area.  We appreciate the 5 minutes Kimberly Karavan set up. We sent off our back log of blog & to bed.

An early morning walk before sunrise, then a late breakfast & a swim, another great start to a lazy day.  Tereza wasn’t gold panning after breakfast either.  The only real effort today was the drive up to Gregory Downs with our toilet container to empty it at the dump point & give it a clean.  We lit a fire this morning to cook a damper in our camp oven & found a slightly charred result that you nearly had to use an axe to cut.  It still tasted good with some honey & the charcoal scraped off.  We lazed most of the day, Tereza reading a Wilbur Smith novel & me bird watching & snoozing at times.  Time for another swim.  We rounded out the day chatting at the fireside of some new found camping friends until bed time.

My Lord and Master was waiting for his breakfast but he received a burnt offering instead.  Another very nice day, 29.5C hard to believe how cold it is in Canberra.  So many birds here but they not very co-operative about photo shoots.  This morning on our walk we came across a fellow camper with a most amazing blown tire.

Mother Nature certainly turned on her best for us at this place but the last flood at Easter the spot we are camping at was under about 10 metres of fast flowing water, you can see the debris up in the trees.

Most people you meet are really nice & friendly but have no name, just where they have been or where they are going & the usual farewell is “safe journey, might bump into you somewhere on the road again.”

Again we Stayed in camp besides the Gregory River & did a few necessary things, like reading, swimming, collecting firewood, swimming, walking, swimming, bird watching.  We went for a walk this morning up to the Gregory Downs settlement & discovered the public toilets with showers, (we don’t need a shower we are clean from all the swimming) a dump point (important as we must use our toilet, this public toilet is at least 10 minute walk from the camp) & the Gregory Downs hotel/motel/shop/petrol, a very old building that has stood the test of time.  There is also a caravan park with a few caravans in it, nowhere near as good as we have it down on the river.  We went exploring further & found the Telstra exchange (very small) next door to the Gregory education facility, complete with satellite dishes & power generator & covered playground, the only lovely new building.  There were a few horses roaming around feeding, a few derelict overgrown disused buildings & a few derelict overgrown used buildings.  This area is also used as a camp (dog boxes with an air conditioner) for the road workers & other contractors working in the area.  We walked back over the new, high concrete road bridge and were amazed to see flood debris caught in the trees a long way above the bridge, the floods in this river must be at least 10 metres deep.

The last bit of exploring we did tonight with our head torches on the little island across from our campsite, discovering fish asleep, frogs & disturbing a sleeping water bird.  We warmed our wet feet on an abandoned campfire near our Karavan before hitting the roost.

The people that transit through this little camp are most amazing, there is a woman who gives Thai massage for $35 an hour, another will give a haircut for $10, 1 sells homemade jam & our neighbour paints peoples dogs, others will tow foolish people out of the river, offer you cut wood (some have chainsaws with them). Ron helped an older gentleman with the use of his mobile phone (Ron must have that Telstra look about him).  There are people with satellite dishes and watch TV, and have proper washing machines & mini Hills Hoist clothes dryers. Most people are so friendly and kind – it’s a real village atmosphere.  A lady gave us a Traveller’s Guide to Australian Interstate Quarantine booklet, which is very handy as we will be entering Northern Territory & Western Australia soon.  We have vegetables for one day.  We still have ½ jar honey (so plenty of honey on Ron’s oats, toast and damper). We still have some oranges & lemons from Grafton.  I started to freeze the lemon juice, (I need it for my water) & we’ll juice the oranges, it is OK if they are processed.  I hate to throw things away.

Ron started to relax, this place is very therapeutic. We will stay another day & leave Monday.  We are not in a hurry as we don’t have to be in Alice Springs until the 2^nd of August, that’s when our friends, Sue & John are due to arrive and they will continue the journey with us.