Tuesday 15th June
We set out this morning for Kununurra through some beautiful scenery still in the Cockburn Range on the Victoria Highway.
We stopped in Kununurra mid’ morning to see if we could snag a caravan park site for a few nights as we have quite a bit to do bu the place is full, even the overflow park is full.
Pat had some important papers to get printed and posted to the UK, so we went into town and parked at the Visitors Centre. The Library were very helpful and printed the forms for me and then Pat was able to get them posted. Marge did a bit of essential shopping while this was going on. Richard booked us into a caravan park in Katherine for a night and then we refuelled and set out for Katherine, 500 ks away.
We drove 150ks and then found a gravel quarry suitable for a night stop. A fire and some satellites rounded off another day.
Wednesday 16th June
An early start this morning as we have some 350 ks to get to Katherine. The road is pretty good and takes us through some magic scenery in the Victoria River Gorge. We decide to stop eventually to stretch our legs at the Victoria River Roadhouse.
We’ve been here before, last time we stayed here overnight. Today, we have to keep moving and we get to the campsite (Manbulloo Homestead) which is ten ks to the west of Katherine, a grassy spot that we are encouraged to water. Water is not a problem here. We decide to book in for 4 nights, this will give us a chance to veg out a bit whilst getting stuff done on the cars and caravans.
Thursday 17th June.
Went shopping in town this morning, then back to camp spent the rest of the day relaxing and doing a couple of jobs on the caravan.
Richard made contact with another Bushtracker couple, Greg and Di, they came over for nibbles and drinks at wine o’clock. They were heading up to Darwin and Kakadu.
Friday 18th June
More shopping this morning, to get us to Alice Springs. Lunch at a nice little restaurant in town, very pleasant in the garden out the back. Next we went to the museum which was much more interesting than we expected and we stayed for a couple of hours, til closing time, having seen about 75% of the exhibits. Katherine has had a fascinating history and some of its prominent characters were amazing people, such as Dr Clyde Fenton who had the idea of visiting his remote patients by plane. Fortunately, he was a better doctor than he was a pilot!
To round the day off we went for a quick dip at the hot springs.
Saturday 19th June
A very early start this morning as we’re going on the dawn cruise in Katherine Gorge departing at 7am. First we have to drive 40 minutes, starting in the dark. it is light by the time we arrive and we have a brisk walk to the boat where the trees are covered in brown bats. We wait under the canopies to escape the frequent droppings before getting into the boat!
Hundreds of thousands of fruit bats occupy the trees by the river. Apparently they don’t eat fruit, only flowers. The local indigenous people used to eat the sweetish meat but unfortunately the bats have a virus which makes them inedible.
The early morning start meant that one side of the gorge was in shadow for most of the trip which makes photography difficult, apologies. I think you can still see that the gorge is really impressive. We get to visit two levels of the gorge, which are separated by rock barriers. There are boats above the barriers so we transfer from one boat to the next by walking on a concrete path.
It turned out to be a very interesting trip, our indigenous guide was very good and if there were a few more influential indigenous people with his mindset we get much further with our reconciliation work.
This art work was interesting, some of it dated to around 15,000 years old, whilst some was as recent as 150 years old.
On returning to the camp site we took the opportunity to do some work on the caravan which kept us busy until wine o’clock when, Mick and Lynda, new BT owners joined us for a chat.
Sunday 20th June
Left Katherine early this morning with a relatively short run to Mataranka and the hot springs at Bitter Springs.
We’ve been to the Springs in Mataranka itself but the last time we tried to get in to Bitter Springs there was a bush fire near it and although we set out down the road to it we were flagged down by a firefighter and so we had to turn round.
This time we can just find somewhere to park the vans and get ourselves into the water…..
……… then oh! @#$% I still have my hearing aids in!!!!
Leap out, run to the caravan, get out the hair dryer and try to dry them out!
Back to the springs leaving the h/aids in their dehumidifier and keeping fingers crossed. I never did the gentle drift down-stream but caught up with the others at the exiting steps.
The general opinion is that these hot springs are better than the Mataranka ones. Not sure we agree.
Lunch and then back on the road again to find a camping spot for tonight. We have in mind a place called Gorrie, a WW11 airfield. When we get there we find that the runway is still intact and useable by quite large piston-engined planes, the surface is a bit loose for turbo props.
The runway is over 4000′ and the overall width is about 300′ so there are many options for campsites. We drive nearly all the way to the end. out come the chairs and the campfire is lit, to one side of the airstrip. The night got quite chilly as the sun went down.
Monday 21st June
Today were heading south again towards Alice and the morning stop is at Daly Waters, another WW11 air base.
I should explain that there are many WW11 airfields up the Stuart Hwy, mostly built by the Americans.
Daly Waters was used after the war as a refuelling stop for flights between the UK and Sydney. At one stage mail flights from Perth, Singapore and Sydney met here to exchange mails from the UK.
Another gravel pit is tonight’s stopping place.
Tuesday 22nd June
A cold start this morning and we are all wearing warmer clothes. We have a longish (for us) run today of 320 ks, so apart from the odd comfort stop and morning tea at Wauchope which has gone downhill, even for a roadhouse, since we were last here.
Another gravel pit tonight, which we have to ourselves again.
Wednesday 23rd June
We have a relatively easy run today on the way we will nip in and have a look at the Devil’s Marbles.
A common feature of the landscape in the northern half of Australia are anthills. There many varieties of ants and they construct different designs of anthills, some are rounded, some are flat, others pointed. Beside the Stuart Hwy they are rounded and oddly shaped. Sometimes they look like little people as bored travellers have dressed them up!
The Devi’s Marbles are enormous boulders strewn across the landscape, some being balanced apparently precariously on top of each other.
Our campsite tonight is an unknown, i.e. we have not stopped here before. It is difficult to spot and I drove past it and had to turn round. When we’d got in and had a look around we found a great spot well away from the road.
We got a fire ready and had lit it when the rain that had been threatening all day started. We have to keep an eye on the rain in these campsites because if we get to much rain it possible to get stuck there until it dries out.
Anyway, we felt like the weathermen people tonight as one minute we were sitting round the fire, then under the awning, round the fire again, under the awning……………………… Eventually we gave up and went inside!
Thursday 24th June
Another very cold start to the day (2 degrees C) . A short run into Alice today but on the way we stop at Barrow Creek Telegraph Station. This one of the repeater stations for the Overland Telegraph in Australia which connected London with Adelaide.
As you can see from the map this was a massive undertaking. Initiated and implemented by Charles Todd who had been recruited by the South Australian government as their Post Master General. He completed the project, 3,200 kilometres of wire on poles through the harsh centre of Australia from Adelaide to Darwin, completed in 1872. It was the beginning of Australia’s communications with the rest of the world.
These days we just drive out here in our air conditioned vehicles but 150 years ago it would have been an extremely hard life. We have nothing but admiration for those pioneers who completed projects out in the bush, such as this.
We find our caravan park in Alice and get settled in, we have quite a lot to do while we’re here.
Alice Springs is named after Alice, the daughter of Charles Todd, he of the overland telegraph line. The fresh water springs were discovered by Todd’s advanced party just north of a gap through the McDonald Range through which the telegraph line could run without difficulty.
Today ‘the Gap’ is the throughway for the Todd River, the Stuart Hwy (Adelaide to Darwin) and the north / south railway line, again Adelaide to Darwin. So it the not only the major north/south route, it is the only one, thus Alice has become an important town of some 30,000 souls.
I tried to make a video so you could see how narrow the Gap is. There are southbound (first) and northbound sections. On the northbound section you should be able to see how close the railway is to the road! I think they must have a safety dispensation to run a busy rail line that close to the road.
Sunday 27th June
BREAKING NEWS – a FIFO mine worker has been diagnosed with Covid-19, he has 33 contacts in Alice Springs and 100 in Darwin!!!!
We can get out of Alice pretty quickly but where do we go? If we’re out in the bush we should stay out of trouble but our plan was to head into QLD but they have their own problems in metropolitan Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. NSW has hotspots in and around Sydney so we don’t want to go there. Will we be able to get back into WA which is currently in a 3 day lockdown too?!
Watch this space!
Alloveroz 