We are late with the post this week - now Wednesday of the following week! We have been in Nat Parks and signal has been non existant for parts of last week. Anyway, here is the weekly roundup for last week.
We left you in Cape Leveque last time so we will take up from there. It has been an interesting week with some real highlights and some very real lows - we are hoping that the low from this week might be the worst for the whole trip.
Monday - we reluctanctly packed up and left Cape Leveque. The only upside of this was that we were returning to Broome. We spent a little time on the retail strip and did a bit of retail therapy - no trip to Broome is complete without a Broome pearl or pearl product. We all have a little bit of Broome tucked away in secret places in the car. As tempting as it is to wear these lovely things, we will not be doing so out here in the dust and the sand.
Tuesday - today was housework day. Mal and I rewired the trailer (again) but this time we had more access to tools that help do the job properly. We are still electrical rookies so we have to cross our fingers that it is working. It is hard to really know till we are out in a Nat Park for more than 2 -3 days (battery drain) and then back in the car for a day (hoepfully charging as we drive due to our wiring job) and then into a new place - then we will know if it is working. Watch this space or listen for the scream if it doesn't work! The car went into ARB in the afternoon for a Day Spa appointment and came back with a clean bill of health. Good to know that even after all the rough and dusty roads that our shocks and everything else on the undercarriage is good to go.
Wednesday - our last day in Broome was spent mooching at the beach, swimming at Cable Beach and starting the pack down for a get away the next morning. One last sunset and some great photos.
Thursday - today we drove to Eighty Mile Beach. Another great place on the WA coastline. We walked the very long beach in the afternoon after setting up and in the late afternoon, a jazz band that was travelling and had stopped at the same place gave an impromptu concert. It was terrific. The sun was setting over the dunes and over the water and the band was playing and the singer was fantastic too. We all sat and enjoyed this experience along with the rest of the campsite. A special night. It was a good finish to what had been a hot long drive through expanses of nothing. We stopped for lunch today in a roadside parking area - it was so hot, no shade and after a quick comfort stop in the bush and a hasty sandwich lunch, we were all happy to be moving again.
Friday - our worst day so far. The opening line in my diary says "A very bad day today." We had travelled about 150kms down the road and Rachel noticed that the computer bag only had 1 USB stick in it instead of 2. The girls have a USB stick here with them to put photos on to when their camera sticks are full, and I have one for the same purpose. Normally, when the camera stick is full, we head to the nearest photo processing place and print them off and then store them on the USB stick before erasing the camera stick ready to go again. Mal pulled over immediately as a lost photo USB stick is a big deal for us. It had all our photos from Week 1 through to Week 6 stored on it in lovely organised folders and since we haven't been near a civilised town for weeks really, there hasn't been a lot of processing going on. And those of you who know me will know that I love to scrapbook our photos and make a story and memory from them and it is my main hobby really. So, there we are on the edge of this desolate highway in the searing heat emptying out the back seat of the car. Then we emptied out the front seats and the entire cabin of the car. No joy. Couldn't find it anywhere. I cried. I don't think the girls have ever really seen me cry like that before - I was very upset. The thought of losing all my photos with no back up was really upsetting. We repacked the car and continued on - nothing else to do really - and it was a sombre car trip. No one spoke at all. Mal stopped to pick some Sturt Desert Peas off the verge of the road to try and cheer me up which was a loevely gesture but there was an ants nest inside them and after handing them to me, I was covered in ants in about 30 seconds. Much leg slapping and chair hitting later and we managed to exterminate them all and the flowers were chucked out the window at speed. The site marked on the map that we could stop for lunch had a locked gate when we arrived so we had lunch in the searing heat again and when Mal opened the barn door at the back of the car to get the lunch bag out, the medicine box fell out and the contents spewed everywhere. When we arrived in Point Samson the tide was out and Rachel was unable to snorkel - which was the reason for the visit and then we couldn't get a site anywhere there for the night so had to move on to Karratha which is not such a nice place to be. We found a place to stay in a van park owned by BHP Biliton and used to house the workers in the mines there that can't be accomodated anywhere else. They don't like tourists. We should have guessed that we were going to have a rotten rest of the day - sure enough, lots of things went wrong from here like a set of dominoes. They gave us a concrete slab so we couldn't put in any tent pegs - it was blowing a gale and I was hit in the head by the tent as we tried to hold it up against the wind as Mal valiantly tried (and succeeded) to guy rope it to the bull bar of the car. There were no bins, no camp kitchen, $66 a night (!), no bread and milk in the van park shop ( no shop, just a well oiled cash register as the charge for using a credit card for a camp site was a hefty 6% - we paid cash) and our site was right next to the chemical toilet dump site. We forgot to get the air bed pump out of the tub of the trailer and had to send Eloise into the closed space to retrieve it -(we have done this before without incident - but today, she got caught coming out on the catch and scraped all up her belly and wasn't very happy. The head winds today were awful in the car and the diesel consumption was sky high so Mal was not overly happy either. We decided that we should eat dinner and go straight to bed. So we did. I lay awake for a long time pondering the loss of 6 weeks of photos. I have sent some printed photos home to Dad but we aren't sure how many weeks are missing from the equation. And all of Mal's are missing as he had moved all of his to the stick. His camera takes better night and dark shots than mine so between the two of us,we are covered. I decided that it could be a lot worse (the car could be damaged, the tent ruined, the kids sick, Mal injured etc) and eventually I fell asleep.
Saturday - In the car today we had a family conference. Without giving too much family business away, we were able to track back through the how, when, where and why of the lost USB. It is more than likely lying in the dust at the lunch stop out of Broome. Or there is a very very slim chance it is in the car somewhere. Not likely. This day was a defining moment for our family as we dealt with topics of blame, guilt, accident, laziness, unconditional love and the ability to move on from things that are upsetting. We won't be divulging who was responsible but if you could sell children on Ebay................ We drove to Dampier to see the Aboriginal Pteroglyphs - the biggest number in one place in the world before we hit the road in earnest. After driving all day through nothing, we decided to stop at 5pm at a free camp on the side of the road at Yanardie Creek - just us and about 40 caravans. We decided to just run with the roof top tent that night so it was an interesting night with 4 of us up there. Mal only lasted a short while before he bailed out to the comfort of the passenger seat in the car. He seems to be able to sleep anywhere and when I checked up on him during the night, he was fast asleep! It was cold overnight which was a bit of a shock to the system and we were all scrabbling at the bottom of the clothes bags for long jumpers.
Sunday - Today we arrrived in Exmouth at the edge of Cape Range National Park. It is also the home of Nigaloo Reef. We set up the camper in a very nice van park and then headed out to explore. We saw so many whales just playing close to the shore. It was spectacular. Mal checked out the fishing spots ready to do some serious fishing in the next couple of days. At the top of the peninsula you can see the sea out of both windows of the car - it's really weird. We will be here a few days now so we are looking forward to the wonders of the reef this week coming.
The good, the bad and the ugly - the good would be body surfing at Cable Beach, the bad - losing the USB stick and the ugly - the camp site at Karratha that cost $66 for the privilege of setting up next to the campsite toilet dump site.
Dream stealers - none to report this week. They are busy thinking up new things to tell us for next week. We are back on track and ready to fend them off when they come at us.
There are no photos this week - we will have some again next week.
Cheers
The Crawford Crew
Wednesday, 31 August 2011
Sunday, 21 August 2011
Weekly roundup - Week 7
It's the end of the week, Sunday night, and we are in Cape Leveque. It is a most wonderful place that is still largely untouched by development. The road here from Broome is 4WD only and is a deep sandy track with some corrugated sections - nothing on the Gibb River Road though so we felt we were almost on a super highway. It takes about 4.5 hours to get from Broome to here over 200km's but although the road needs to be driven with care, the rewards when you get here are well worth the effort. Endless beach with hardly another soul on them. There are three places you can stay here - Middle Lagoon which is very popular, Cygnet Bay which is lovely and where we are at the very tip at Kooljaman. Tonight I can hear the waves on the shore as I type. It is warm - tropical warm - and we can see the stars. We know there are others around us but here they are very careful to spread you out so you feel you are here all alone - you have to book to come here and you need a permit to enter the area which is now all designated Aboriginal Land. Beagle Bay on the way here is an amazing place too - there is a church there that was built in the 1890's by the Monks who were here as missionaries and the whole inside is inlaid with Mother of Pearl. It is not a museum and is used every week as the local Catholic Church.
This afternoon we headed to the beach on the east side of the point and drove along it for a bit. Then we headed to the west side where the girls played in the sand and eventually and inevitably got wet to their middles and then just ran around in t shirts. Mal threw his line in with the larger of his two rods and had fun trying to catch dinner. I sat on the beach and watched the numerous whales and their calves frolic around just off the coast - lots of tail slapping, fin flapping and breaching. This is the closest I have ever come to whales or to seeing them so it was a fairly momentous afternoon for me. We stayed and watched the sun go down and I took many many photos - I am no photographer so I am hoping at least one might be OK. Mal has just cooked a huge feast on the BBQ and we have even had dessert tonight.
Tonight marks the half way point of our adventure. We have seen so much and learnt about so many places, met lots of people and had some challenges along the way. From here the bonnet points south - a funny thought after always heading north till now. We are staying some extra days in Broome and will roll out of there on Thursday next week making tracks for Eighty Mile Beach and then Port Hedland.
Last night we took the girls to the Sun Outdoor cinema in Broome to see the movie Red Dog. We sat in canvas chairs under the stars. We all really enjoyed the movie and will see the Red Dog statue in Dampier when we get down the coast that far. It is an excellent movie and if you get a chance to go and see it, we highly recommend it! We caught up with Lynwen and Michael, Carys and Brynley (I met Lynwen in Rachel's mother's group/playgroup) and had pizza on Cable Beach as the sun went down and then we all went to the movies together. It is amazing to meet people on the road that you know from home.
The Good, the bad and the ugly awards this week are - the good would have to be that we are in Cape Leveque. It is one of the very best places I have ever been to in my life and I would love to come here again another time. The bad this week goes to the cough that got the better of me at the start of the week and forced me to seek medical help. Thankfully I had started taking some antibiotics which helped a lot and the doctor that saw me at the Derby hospital gave me some wonder drugs to supress the cough which allowed me to get some sleep (and everyone else in the trailer!) and I got better fairly quickly after that. The ugly needs a bit of explanation. Some people travel around in what they call fifth wheelers - not sure why they are called that but they are huge motor homes that attach to a truck cab by way of a massive tow ball that is in the middle of the tray of the truck. They are huge - bigger than some people's homes and they tend to be "moored" in van parks for several months at a time. A lot of the people who own these monstrous things feel very much like they are the king pins in the park and that they own the jolly place. We happen to be camped opposite from one such rig. It is the big next to the small. When we pulled into Broome, the 5th wheeler crew sat in their reclining chairs, beers in hand and watched our every move as we hammered in pegs and got ourselves set up. We gave them a wave, but were snobbed off. We persisted each day for 3 days to say hello on the way past, or when we went to get something from the car - but were greeted with complete indifference. So, the next day, Mal got jack of all that and as he came back from the bathrooms, all clean and shiny, he waved and sang out a cheery hello. No response. So he had a laugh out loud at their expense. That managed to ilicit a response - the fellow puffed out his chest, snorted, cleared his throat, tried to speak and went red in the face. Mal sauntered along towards our humble digs and said in a loud voice, "hey Jane, they aren't statues over there, I think they are real people." The very next day, the lady of the party said hello to me as I went past to the bathroom! They still carry on like they own the place (they have even comandeered one of the bins as their very own - and guess who puts rubbish in it.....) but at least they say hello to us now. Their call sign on the back of the rig doesn't say "John and Sue, UHF 18 or 40" but "King and Queen of the Road, UHF 17" If we meet them on the road anywhere Mal is sure to call them up for a chat. "Hey King of the Road, are you on channel. This is the Tonka Toy crew here. Are we right to pass. We have a clear stretch of 5kms in front.......
Love and starry skies,
Jane and Mal and Rachel and Eloise
This afternoon we headed to the beach on the east side of the point and drove along it for a bit. Then we headed to the west side where the girls played in the sand and eventually and inevitably got wet to their middles and then just ran around in t shirts. Mal threw his line in with the larger of his two rods and had fun trying to catch dinner. I sat on the beach and watched the numerous whales and their calves frolic around just off the coast - lots of tail slapping, fin flapping and breaching. This is the closest I have ever come to whales or to seeing them so it was a fairly momentous afternoon for me. We stayed and watched the sun go down and I took many many photos - I am no photographer so I am hoping at least one might be OK. Mal has just cooked a huge feast on the BBQ and we have even had dessert tonight.
Tonight marks the half way point of our adventure. We have seen so much and learnt about so many places, met lots of people and had some challenges along the way. From here the bonnet points south - a funny thought after always heading north till now. We are staying some extra days in Broome and will roll out of there on Thursday next week making tracks for Eighty Mile Beach and then Port Hedland.
Last night we took the girls to the Sun Outdoor cinema in Broome to see the movie Red Dog. We sat in canvas chairs under the stars. We all really enjoyed the movie and will see the Red Dog statue in Dampier when we get down the coast that far. It is an excellent movie and if you get a chance to go and see it, we highly recommend it! We caught up with Lynwen and Michael, Carys and Brynley (I met Lynwen in Rachel's mother's group/playgroup) and had pizza on Cable Beach as the sun went down and then we all went to the movies together. It is amazing to meet people on the road that you know from home.
The Good, the bad and the ugly awards this week are - the good would have to be that we are in Cape Leveque. It is one of the very best places I have ever been to in my life and I would love to come here again another time. The bad this week goes to the cough that got the better of me at the start of the week and forced me to seek medical help. Thankfully I had started taking some antibiotics which helped a lot and the doctor that saw me at the Derby hospital gave me some wonder drugs to supress the cough which allowed me to get some sleep (and everyone else in the trailer!) and I got better fairly quickly after that. The ugly needs a bit of explanation. Some people travel around in what they call fifth wheelers - not sure why they are called that but they are huge motor homes that attach to a truck cab by way of a massive tow ball that is in the middle of the tray of the truck. They are huge - bigger than some people's homes and they tend to be "moored" in van parks for several months at a time. A lot of the people who own these monstrous things feel very much like they are the king pins in the park and that they own the jolly place. We happen to be camped opposite from one such rig. It is the big next to the small. When we pulled into Broome, the 5th wheeler crew sat in their reclining chairs, beers in hand and watched our every move as we hammered in pegs and got ourselves set up. We gave them a wave, but were snobbed off. We persisted each day for 3 days to say hello on the way past, or when we went to get something from the car - but were greeted with complete indifference. So, the next day, Mal got jack of all that and as he came back from the bathrooms, all clean and shiny, he waved and sang out a cheery hello. No response. So he had a laugh out loud at their expense. That managed to ilicit a response - the fellow puffed out his chest, snorted, cleared his throat, tried to speak and went red in the face. Mal sauntered along towards our humble digs and said in a loud voice, "hey Jane, they aren't statues over there, I think they are real people." The very next day, the lady of the party said hello to me as I went past to the bathroom! They still carry on like they own the place (they have even comandeered one of the bins as their very own - and guess who puts rubbish in it.....) but at least they say hello to us now. Their call sign on the back of the rig doesn't say "John and Sue, UHF 18 or 40" but "King and Queen of the Road, UHF 17" If we meet them on the road anywhere Mal is sure to call them up for a chat. "Hey King of the Road, are you on channel. This is the Tonka Toy crew here. Are we right to pass. We have a clear stretch of 5kms in front.......
Love and starry skies,
Jane and Mal and Rachel and Eloise
Thursday, 18 August 2011
We survived the Gibb River Road!.
This blog entry comes to you from Broome. The Gibb is now behind us and we have reached the coast on the opposite side of the country.
The Gibb - is a hard road.
The Gibb - makes things break on your car.
The Gibb - is very dusty and corrugated.
The Gibb - is no place for people without prepared vehicles.
The Gibb - has awesome gorges and waterfalls and wildlife that you don't see anywhere else.
The Gibb - has incredible places to camp where you feel like you are the only people within a hundred kilometres of anyone else.
The view from our campsite at Home Valley on the Gibb. The full moon over the Kimberley's was an awesome site.
The Gibb claimed our Anderson Plug (the electrical connection between the car and the trailer that charges our camper battery as we drive so when we stop we can power our fridge overnight off the camper trailer - without one you can't keep your fridge food cold which could mean that you have no food for the duration of the trip!), 2 D shackles off the trailer chains (they help hold the trailer on to the car) and the radio aerial - we lost the top section one day and then the middle section the next day. It just wobbles so much that it snaps and sheers off. Anderson Plugs are not easily sourced on the Gibb River Road but at a roadhouse I managed to chat up the resident mechanic (while Mal waited round the corner with the car) and he gave me the last one that he had. Yay for us. Mal rewired it that night in the searing afternoon heat and the dust and we managed to restore our power. We are both coming home to apply for Recognition of Prior Learning with CIT in the Auto Electrics Cert IV course. The D shackles were lost a day apart and Mal wired our last and final one on with such precision that the whole tow bar would have to fall off before we lost any more. We have discovered that with gaff tape and cable ties you can fix anything. We had nick named our aerial Dolly Parton ( it had a lot of wobble going on) and we lost her top half on the first day. The next day her middle section looked like it might go west before we did so we gaffed it but it was all too much for her and she sheered off leaving us with Dolly's stubby little legs. The radio works - with crackle, but we can still transmit and receive - handy when one needs to pass "Cheryl and Bob" on the highway. The Gibb river experience called on all our patience, planning, map reading and life skills to get through to the other end. We had to make some hard decisions about which things we would see and which things were going to take too much of a toll on the car - it came down to risk management a few times and I confess to be disappointed not to have made it to Mitchell Falls but not so disappointed that I can't move on.
The gorges are amazing, the scenery second to none and you really have to see it to "get it". The girls swam in waterfalls, we witnessed amazing sunsets and camped in the most wonderful places away from traffic and people. We crossed the mighty Pentecost River - a long and reasonably deep river crossing - and many many other creek crossings. We would have lost count of the number of wet crossings we did if Eloise hadn't been diligently counting them in the backseat.
We are now in Broome for a little while. We need to stop for a week or so to de-dust, rest a little and enjoy life in a bigger town for a bit. We love drinking fresh milk again and having showers. We have been for a camel ride, driven on Cable Beach, swum at Cable Beach, and we have only been here a day and a half!
Unbelieveably, we were camping at a camp site called Silent Grove on the Gibb River Road and a girl walked past that I thought I recognised from the playgroup I was in when Rach was born. I shook my head and decided I was dreaming, but amazingly, it was her! She is here travelling for 6 months with her family and doing roughly the same route as us. We had a couple of chats and swapped blog addresses - we are bound to see them again some time as they are due back for the start of Term 4 as we are. They are heading to Broome in a couple of days - they are more hardy than us and were still going strong on the Gibb River Road when we left them.
So, to the good, the bad and the ugly - The Good this week - making it over the Gibb River without a single flat tyre and without any serious mechanical issues. The bad - dust, corrugations, dust, corrugations, dust, corrugations.............. The Ugly - the German tourist at Windjana Gorge who went too close to the freshwater crocs and got her hand savaged and her arm bitten - there is no telling some people. She had an unexpected trip to the Derby hospital that evening. She just wanted to have a photo up close and personal with a croc - well she got that and more.
Dream Stealers - plenty of them this week - the road to Cape Leveque is impassable (sure, that's why accomodation is tight there and lots of people are turning up in our campsite having just been there), Coopers Tyres are rubbish (sure, we just did the Gibb with Coopers without a single flat which is unheard of), Broome is so busy you can't get a site for the night (sure, that's why we are happily sitting in our van park with a powered site and intend to be here for a few more days yet). You will recall that last week the Dream Stealers reckoned that the Gibb was terrible - well, it was pretty tough but we did it without major mechanical issues and are triumphant in having made it. The other comment was that the road to the Mitchell Falls was terrible - well, they win that one. The road to Drysdale (which is half way) was very testing and we decided that we wouldn't go any further and the next day turned back towards the Gibb happy at having tried, disappointed at having not made it, and sure that we had made the best decision.
We have all settled into a happy routine and are all enjoying the road trip. There is so much to see and there is never a boring day - the girls are happy to listen to their ipods on long travel days and they seem to sing everywhere they go and when they are doing any jobs. You can hear them in the shower blocks and as they unload the car and as they blow up their air beds. Sometimes they even sing in harmony!
The girls at Galvan's Gorge. Hard to get them to move on! It really is a case of scenery overload - it's almost too much for your eyes to take in after a while. We have seen some truly beautiful and stunning sights.
Love from Dusty, Busty, and the two Lusty's
The Gibb - is a hard road.
The Gibb - makes things break on your car.
The Gibb - is very dusty and corrugated.
The Gibb - is no place for people without prepared vehicles.
The Gibb - has awesome gorges and waterfalls and wildlife that you don't see anywhere else.
The Gibb - has incredible places to camp where you feel like you are the only people within a hundred kilometres of anyone else.
Me 12 feet off the ground at the start of the Gibb River Road. (don't anyone ask how Mal got me up there - it's a heavily guarded secret)
The Gibb claimed our Anderson Plug (the electrical connection between the car and the trailer that charges our camper battery as we drive so when we stop we can power our fridge overnight off the camper trailer - without one you can't keep your fridge food cold which could mean that you have no food for the duration of the trip!), 2 D shackles off the trailer chains (they help hold the trailer on to the car) and the radio aerial - we lost the top section one day and then the middle section the next day. It just wobbles so much that it snaps and sheers off. Anderson Plugs are not easily sourced on the Gibb River Road but at a roadhouse I managed to chat up the resident mechanic (while Mal waited round the corner with the car) and he gave me the last one that he had. Yay for us. Mal rewired it that night in the searing afternoon heat and the dust and we managed to restore our power. We are both coming home to apply for Recognition of Prior Learning with CIT in the Auto Electrics Cert IV course. The D shackles were lost a day apart and Mal wired our last and final one on with such precision that the whole tow bar would have to fall off before we lost any more. We have discovered that with gaff tape and cable ties you can fix anything. We had nick named our aerial Dolly Parton ( it had a lot of wobble going on) and we lost her top half on the first day. The next day her middle section looked like it might go west before we did so we gaffed it but it was all too much for her and she sheered off leaving us with Dolly's stubby little legs. The radio works - with crackle, but we can still transmit and receive - handy when one needs to pass "Cheryl and Bob" on the highway. The Gibb river experience called on all our patience, planning, map reading and life skills to get through to the other end. We had to make some hard decisions about which things we would see and which things were going to take too much of a toll on the car - it came down to risk management a few times and I confess to be disappointed not to have made it to Mitchell Falls but not so disappointed that I can't move on.
The gorges are amazing, the scenery second to none and you really have to see it to "get it". The girls swam in waterfalls, we witnessed amazing sunsets and camped in the most wonderful places away from traffic and people. We crossed the mighty Pentecost River - a long and reasonably deep river crossing - and many many other creek crossings. We would have lost count of the number of wet crossings we did if Eloise hadn't been diligently counting them in the backseat.
We are now in Broome for a little while. We need to stop for a week or so to de-dust, rest a little and enjoy life in a bigger town for a bit. We love drinking fresh milk again and having showers. We have been for a camel ride, driven on Cable Beach, swum at Cable Beach, and we have only been here a day and a half!
The car and the crew on Cable Beach. Note the shorty aerial and the back flare that is still gaffed on since our time in Katherine! Gaff tape is a wonderful thing.
Unbelieveably, we were camping at a camp site called Silent Grove on the Gibb River Road and a girl walked past that I thought I recognised from the playgroup I was in when Rach was born. I shook my head and decided I was dreaming, but amazingly, it was her! She is here travelling for 6 months with her family and doing roughly the same route as us. We had a couple of chats and swapped blog addresses - we are bound to see them again some time as they are due back for the start of Term 4 as we are. They are heading to Broome in a couple of days - they are more hardy than us and were still going strong on the Gibb River Road when we left them.
So, to the good, the bad and the ugly - The Good this week - making it over the Gibb River without a single flat tyre and without any serious mechanical issues. The bad - dust, corrugations, dust, corrugations, dust, corrugations.............. The Ugly - the German tourist at Windjana Gorge who went too close to the freshwater crocs and got her hand savaged and her arm bitten - there is no telling some people. She had an unexpected trip to the Derby hospital that evening. She just wanted to have a photo up close and personal with a croc - well she got that and more.
Dream Stealers - plenty of them this week - the road to Cape Leveque is impassable (sure, that's why accomodation is tight there and lots of people are turning up in our campsite having just been there), Coopers Tyres are rubbish (sure, we just did the Gibb with Coopers without a single flat which is unheard of), Broome is so busy you can't get a site for the night (sure, that's why we are happily sitting in our van park with a powered site and intend to be here for a few more days yet). You will recall that last week the Dream Stealers reckoned that the Gibb was terrible - well, it was pretty tough but we did it without major mechanical issues and are triumphant in having made it. The other comment was that the road to the Mitchell Falls was terrible - well, they win that one. The road to Drysdale (which is half way) was very testing and we decided that we wouldn't go any further and the next day turned back towards the Gibb happy at having tried, disappointed at having not made it, and sure that we had made the best decision.
We have all settled into a happy routine and are all enjoying the road trip. There is so much to see and there is never a boring day - the girls are happy to listen to their ipods on long travel days and they seem to sing everywhere they go and when they are doing any jobs. You can hear them in the shower blocks and as they unload the car and as they blow up their air beds. Sometimes they even sing in harmony!
Love from Dusty, Busty, and the two Lusty's
Wednesday, 10 August 2011
Aaah and Oooh in Kakadu
Welcome to Week 5! This was the week that was spent mostly in Kakadu. What an awesome place. Plenty of Ooohs and Aaaahs this week. The scenery is amazing. We stayed just out of Jabiru which is the main township in Kakadu and based ourselves there for day trips out to the rest of the park - which is huge. The only commercial touristy thing we did there was a Yellow Water Billabong Cruise which entailed getting up at 5am to drive the 45 minutes to be there for 6.15am for the dawn cruise. Well worth the effort. We saw so many wonderful things that morning. The bird life is incredible and the water plants that are in flower at the moment are so lovely to look at. The sun came up over the water and it was so peaceful and gorgeous that we all wanted it to go on for longer! It was a case of Discovery Channel Live in the boat when two male juvenile crocs decided to have a territorial spat over a slice of river bank - they were quietly sunbaking one moment and turned into fierce fast moving aggressive lizards the next. The tourists on our boat were sufficiently silenced after that - even the yanks! We took the car into Jim Jim and Twin Falls on another day that week and did the obligatory deep river crossing with just big white guide posts to show you where to drive through the water. Very exciting for the little gals in the backseat who madly tried to video the crossing with their cameras only to play back and hear major giggling and comments like "Woah Dad, look at the water, it's right up to the window" and "Hey Dad, did you see the croc". It was a deep crossing but we made it there and back and the reward at Twin Falls was worth the effort. Rachel celebrated her birthday on Thursday of this week and we decorated the tent with a brithday banner and she swam in the waterfall at Gunlom in the afternoon. We visited many Aboringinal Art sites and were blown away with the detail and number of paintings that you could reach out and touch if you were allowed to. We watched the sunset from the top of Ubirr Rock - something we will all remember for a long time to come. On Friday we needed to move on (otherwise we may never get home!!) and we drove back out to Katherine for food supplies and to spend the night before heading to the WA border. We went to Macca's and got ice cream cones instead of a cake for Rach and stuck candles in them in the carpark much to the amusement of the local Aboriginals who were hanging around at the time.
We kept moving and made a stamp the next day for WA. We went over the border and through the quarantine area without incident (having eaten all fruit and veg the day before and for lunch that day). Only had to ditch a bit of honey. We made it into Kununurra to a van park (which was not too nice but the only powered site available at the time and having been in Kakadu we needed to power up to the mains again) and set up for an overnight stop. Unbelievably, I bumped into a lady in the shower block who we saw in Cooktown in 2008 - I did not recognise her but she certainly knew me! This is not such a good thing methinks....... Anyway, she remembered us as the poor people who got blown away in the tent and broke a tent pole overnight in Cooktown and she told us how she and her husband thought about us a lot and wondered how we were going and if we were still camping! We visited their van for big reunions and we were all on our best behaviour. It wasn't till we were leaving that Mal confessed in hushed tones that he had absolutely no idea or memory of them at all! We rolled out the next day and drove to Purnululu National Park (used to be known as the Bungle Bungles). It was a shockingly long drive over boring bitumen in the searing heat - 27 degrees by 8.30am. The road was slow as it is the main drag through from Broome so there are a million vanners using it - including Marge and Gerald on Channel 18 but that is a story for another time (will have to stop giggling to be able to type). Anyway, 3 hours to do 240 kms, and then we arrived at the turn off for the Bungles. We aired down the tyres to do the dirt road in - 52 km's. Not a road for the faint hearted I have to say and it took 2 and a half hours to get there. Numerous water crossings and slow going but an amazing bush camp at the end of it all. Totally private and secluded and we loved not having any people around us or traffic noise - or Gerald and Marge. The next day we went walking and exploring and were all blown away by the rock formations and the Bungles themselves. We spent a full day out in the heat (don't worry Dad, we drank heaps of water and Mal's headache was nothing to do with not having enough water and everything to do with Coke withdrawal). Back at the campsite we had dinner and Mal had his Coke and all was well. We headed to bed and snuggled in for a great night of quiet - till we were woken an hour or so later by a herd of runaway cattle from the cattle station next door to the park. They were so very close to the tent and so very loud. We grabbed the girls from the floor of the tent and put them up on the bed platform with us in case they were trampled and sat it out - mate, they make a heap of noise and when I opened the window to shine my headlite out at them, I was face to face with the most enormous bull snorting at me. I could see right up his nose - not pretty. They all eventually moved off except one who decided to lie down and sleep in the dry river bank behind the camper trailer. Fabulous. Did you know that cows snore? Well they do, and they are loud and they have no one to poke them to get them to roll over so you just have to suck it up and deal with the noise. She moved on too later in the night since all her cow friends were mooing from up the river for her to join them and I finally thought I would get some peace and quiet. As I realigned myself so I could see the marvellous starry view from out the window, and the girls had been removed to the lower accomodation section, I started to relax just as the dingoes started howling. Lucky it was a private camp site. I lost it, Mal just laughed loud and lustily and I lost it even more. The kids slumbered on and Mal began snoring and I began howling for something to do - and to feel more like I belonged somewhere cos the trailer just wasn't doing it for me that night. We left the next day - back to Kununurra which was the same 2.5 hours back to the highway and another boring and hot 3 hours back to Kununurra. We are now into Week 6 and we are ready to head out from here along the Gibb River Road tomorrow. The start of this week has been spent getting meat cryovaced ready for the Gibb River and we have refilled the trailer water tank and fuelled the car. We have aired the roof top tent (Mal's penthouse suite) and we did a huge grocery shop so our pantry box, fruit bag and car food bag are all full to overflowing. No supplies for the next 10 days or so. No internet either so the next post will be a week 6 and 7 combination I think.
Which brings us to the good the bad and the ugly. The good - so hard to choose one thing - probably equally good was Kakadu and seeing the Bungle Bungles up close and for real. The bad - the cows wins that one hands down and the ugly - well that would be price of fuel at Turkey Creek - a cool $2 a litre for diesel, but you can only have some mister, if you give me your license first or your credit card and then you go out and fill er up and then you come in and pay and when I happy, I give you back license or credit card - Mal gave him my license!!! Without a fill up here, you can't do the Bungles without running out of fuel and we have the biggest fuel tank of any fourby out here - these guys weren't happy when Mal pumped in a tiny 30 litres - all we needed to get in and out without running out of fuel. Or maybe the ugly award goes the the cow's nostril........
Plenty of Dream Stealers this week - all telling us the road to Mitchell Falls is undo-able. We shall see. Also plenty of people telling us the Gibb River road is terrible - worst for 5 years. We shall see. The most direct piece of advice was from a girl who told me to breathe deeply and wear a good bra. Hmmm. Could be an interesting week ahead!
Lots of love and sun rays,
Jane Mal Rachel and Eloise
We kept moving and made a stamp the next day for WA. We went over the border and through the quarantine area without incident (having eaten all fruit and veg the day before and for lunch that day). Only had to ditch a bit of honey. We made it into Kununurra to a van park (which was not too nice but the only powered site available at the time and having been in Kakadu we needed to power up to the mains again) and set up for an overnight stop. Unbelievably, I bumped into a lady in the shower block who we saw in Cooktown in 2008 - I did not recognise her but she certainly knew me! This is not such a good thing methinks....... Anyway, she remembered us as the poor people who got blown away in the tent and broke a tent pole overnight in Cooktown and she told us how she and her husband thought about us a lot and wondered how we were going and if we were still camping! We visited their van for big reunions and we were all on our best behaviour. It wasn't till we were leaving that Mal confessed in hushed tones that he had absolutely no idea or memory of them at all! We rolled out the next day and drove to Purnululu National Park (used to be known as the Bungle Bungles). It was a shockingly long drive over boring bitumen in the searing heat - 27 degrees by 8.30am. The road was slow as it is the main drag through from Broome so there are a million vanners using it - including Marge and Gerald on Channel 18 but that is a story for another time (will have to stop giggling to be able to type). Anyway, 3 hours to do 240 kms, and then we arrived at the turn off for the Bungles. We aired down the tyres to do the dirt road in - 52 km's. Not a road for the faint hearted I have to say and it took 2 and a half hours to get there. Numerous water crossings and slow going but an amazing bush camp at the end of it all. Totally private and secluded and we loved not having any people around us or traffic noise - or Gerald and Marge. The next day we went walking and exploring and were all blown away by the rock formations and the Bungles themselves. We spent a full day out in the heat (don't worry Dad, we drank heaps of water and Mal's headache was nothing to do with not having enough water and everything to do with Coke withdrawal). Back at the campsite we had dinner and Mal had his Coke and all was well. We headed to bed and snuggled in for a great night of quiet - till we were woken an hour or so later by a herd of runaway cattle from the cattle station next door to the park. They were so very close to the tent and so very loud. We grabbed the girls from the floor of the tent and put them up on the bed platform with us in case they were trampled and sat it out - mate, they make a heap of noise and when I opened the window to shine my headlite out at them, I was face to face with the most enormous bull snorting at me. I could see right up his nose - not pretty. They all eventually moved off except one who decided to lie down and sleep in the dry river bank behind the camper trailer. Fabulous. Did you know that cows snore? Well they do, and they are loud and they have no one to poke them to get them to roll over so you just have to suck it up and deal with the noise. She moved on too later in the night since all her cow friends were mooing from up the river for her to join them and I finally thought I would get some peace and quiet. As I realigned myself so I could see the marvellous starry view from out the window, and the girls had been removed to the lower accomodation section, I started to relax just as the dingoes started howling. Lucky it was a private camp site. I lost it, Mal just laughed loud and lustily and I lost it even more. The kids slumbered on and Mal began snoring and I began howling for something to do - and to feel more like I belonged somewhere cos the trailer just wasn't doing it for me that night. We left the next day - back to Kununurra which was the same 2.5 hours back to the highway and another boring and hot 3 hours back to Kununurra. We are now into Week 6 and we are ready to head out from here along the Gibb River Road tomorrow. The start of this week has been spent getting meat cryovaced ready for the Gibb River and we have refilled the trailer water tank and fuelled the car. We have aired the roof top tent (Mal's penthouse suite) and we did a huge grocery shop so our pantry box, fruit bag and car food bag are all full to overflowing. No supplies for the next 10 days or so. No internet either so the next post will be a week 6 and 7 combination I think.
Which brings us to the good the bad and the ugly. The good - so hard to choose one thing - probably equally good was Kakadu and seeing the Bungle Bungles up close and for real. The bad - the cows wins that one hands down and the ugly - well that would be price of fuel at Turkey Creek - a cool $2 a litre for diesel, but you can only have some mister, if you give me your license first or your credit card and then you go out and fill er up and then you come in and pay and when I happy, I give you back license or credit card - Mal gave him my license!!! Without a fill up here, you can't do the Bungles without running out of fuel and we have the biggest fuel tank of any fourby out here - these guys weren't happy when Mal pumped in a tiny 30 litres - all we needed to get in and out without running out of fuel. Or maybe the ugly award goes the the cow's nostril........
Plenty of Dream Stealers this week - all telling us the road to Mitchell Falls is undo-able. We shall see. Also plenty of people telling us the Gibb River road is terrible - worst for 5 years. We shall see. The most direct piece of advice was from a girl who told me to breathe deeply and wear a good bra. Hmmm. Could be an interesting week ahead!
Lots of love and sun rays,
Jane Mal Rachel and Eloise
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