Lethargic Sunday

I'm awake an hour before sunrise which is at 4.45am and although I was in stealth mode trying to get up to see it, I failed miserably in not waking someone else up........
But I am not alone outside to see it, half the camp is up, our neighbours are packing to go, people are walking about, having breakfast, using the bathrooms etc it's the busiest I've seen it.
I'm off to use Kununurra's walking route alongside the lake, I also must be the first to use it this morning as i am breaking the cobwebs strung across it and lose count of the number of wallabies I startle, who then run off, stop turn and stare back at me from a safer distance. 
Now bearing in mind it's a Sunday, I am amazed at the amount of traffic on the road before 7am, it's almost the busiest I have seen the roads outside of Perth but then I realise what most of it is, it's people going out to exercise, it's people with boats, with kayaks, dogs needing a walk, going to the golf club, travelling to the next campsite (my now ex neighbour) and to go to work (lots of white ute vehicles) and when I get back at 6.50am the boat ramp car park must have twenty 4x4's with boat trailers attached. I realise if you are going to do it, then do it before it gets hot..... Also I don't think the weather forecast did helped by forecasting thunderstorms from 10am, it's now 6pm and it's been sunny all day........
A late breakfast, either shared with or watched by dozens of different types of lizards, they are all over the place, some bring a smile to our faces when they stand on their back legs and run like the road runner...... Impossible to photograph...... We then set off to walk around the lake, don't get very far before the heat, the early morning start and feeling tired kicks in, what I fancy I say is to go out for a Sunday Lunch, eat, drink and talk over a nice lunch in nice comfortable surroundings.
So with the help of Google, Guide Books and a town map, I decide on Kununurra Country Club, great lets go for 2pm.  We therefore kill time by going food shopping and up Kelly's Knob, a lookout just behind the town. Waste of time except for seeing a tree clinging to life by growing out of a rock, where its roots are actually splitting the rock.
2pm we walk into the Country Club, speak with receptionist about lunch and she replies, "Sorry, Kitchen closes at 2pm"  We walk through to the bar and I spot the chef, a little bit of bull and she says we have two minutes to order........ Result! 
So we sit down in the most comfortable place since Perth, we get table service, good food, NO flagpole with a number on it and NO electronic 'come and get it' buzzer........ Only problem being it's not long before we are on our own as everyone else has eaten between 12 and 2, so have finished, there are no, all afternooners, no just have a drink people, it's lunch, lunch has finished, let's go........
We enjoy our meal, it makes a change from the roadhouse/cafe/bar/Motorhome meals we have had of late........Another beer and then once back its straight into the pool to cool off and chill, this is what Sunday's are for.........
No need for dinner tonight but we have the feeling it's going to be a sing along with our other neighbour who has had music going all day, keeps mentioning it to us and has now got the guitar out and inviting anyone who passes to join him, fortunately I have brought my big gold medallion, white suit, hairy chest wig and know the words to 'Love me tender' huh huh huh........

    What's for Breakfast

   Suppose I'll have to settle for flies.......

    Cracking set of roots....

An uneventful journey.....

Lie in this morning as in no hurry due to knowing we will be travelling back in time, we get an extra hour and half today when we cross the state line back into Western Australia.  So the 535kms journey sets off in its now normal pattern, get out of town, build up speed, put it in cruise and point it forward........ We are going over a road we have all ready travelled on but oh what a difference the rain/storm has made, firstly there are puddles alongside the road, then there are larger puddles that start to encroach on the road, there are creeks with running water in, there are rivers where before they were just a series of large puddles and then there is flooded land...... It all becomes obvious just how quickly this place could become problematical for those that do their own thing and don't take note of warnings etc.  
Note to self: Don't be stupid........
Talking of which, we pull into a roadhouse for a coffee break, it's empty I can park anywhere, I see a nice shady spot, drive over, straighten up, drive forward, not so much crash but more bump, so busy looking at the shade on the ground never noticed the overhanging branch........
When we passed by two weeks ago huge areas were either burnt or looked dry, dusty and basically dead. Today you can see the start of new green shoots and leaves on all the trees, including those with the black charcoal trunks........  In places there are more signs of wildlife returning, which was unfortunate for some of the thousands of baby frogs/toads that were crossing the road at the same time as we were doing a 100k in cruise on the same piece....... 
Another place must have had in excess of 50 Eagles/Kites flying together, circling around something below but they were feeding on something whilst a lot of the smaller  birds were drinking/bathing in the excess water lying around.  There was an increase in the number of insects that head butted the windscreen, as did one magpie type bird chasing the insects........
And then there was the 11 Black Cockatoo's, these elusive shy birds were all together in one tree, until our emergency stop.......... They then regrouped again in the same tree, whilst I tried to park up on the main road, which is a singular two way road with sloping sides that are too steep for a Motorhome to encounter.......  Now bearing in mind we have just travelled over 100k to get to this point with 1 car overtaking us and 6 cars passing on the other side we feel confident enough to park up, jump out and snap a few frames so as to record the moment........ Yep you have guessed it already, along comes a road train on our side of the road with a car on the other side at the same time........... Fortunately the car driver thought better of trying to prove the point of right of way with the road train and whilst an accident was avoided, the noise from said confrontation frightened the Cockatoo's away........... It's not that I felt guilty but when we caught up with the road train, we decided rather than overtake him we would stop and have lunch........ Think it was chicken......... 
We continue once I know we will never see the road train driver again and are driving through some amazing scenic countryside, when I hear, "Look, it's an upside down rainbow" and yes there in the sky was a rainbow, shaped like a U.......  
Later as we approach WA, we get stopped and searched by the food quarantine police......... He is in the bathroom, the fridge and rubbish bag and confiscates our garlic, honey, broccoli stumps, cucumber and the remains of the pepper that I could not eat whilst watching him search the van......... Have a good day he says...... 
Check in at Kununurra on a beautiful camp site on the banks of Lake Kununurra for two days but I can feel an extra day coming on, depending on weather, the next drive is another long one and whilst I like this place I don't want to get locked in due to flooding....
Besides being back in the WA time zone and this far east, it means sunrise is at 4.45am, I feel some early morning exercise coming on followed by some serious earache being received......

    Daddy

    Mummy

Katherine the Sequel

So I awake to find my brand new granddaughter smiling at me on my phone, thankfully which was set on: Do not disturb mode, as they were received at 3am........
The other members of the U.K. Campers Club, which we set up last night are off and so now feeling alone, we also depart so as to walk around the Matalanka Forest.  As we do so, we think a month ago this place would have been so different, its fire damage is obvious and now the flood damage is equally obvious changing its nature completely.  Apparently last week they had 18 inches of rain, per sq metre. We stop in the cafe and notice a sign 6ft above me when standing depicting the flood water level in 1997......... Onwards and a kilometre trek and we find Stevie's Hole, a swimming hole in the river running from the mineral springs, it's alive with Archer fish but closed for swimming, you guessed it, possible crocodiles........... We are watching some wild pigs scratching around Stevie's Hole when we are stealthily approached from behind by a young Kangaroo, which stays for a photo shoot until little miss J, screams out as something has just bitten her leg, being the sympathetic soul I am and having gone through a similar experience where I wanted the flying doctor service, I tell her to rub it better........
As we are walking back to the van, another squeal from miss J as well as a cicada, I trod on it..... but she has found a bright green tree frog, which appears to be slightly unwell, it's sitting out in the bright burning sunshine.  It's picked up and kissed but turns into another me, so she kisses it again, it reverts back to a frog and is put under some shelter in the hope it recovers.......
Long drive tomorrow so book into campsite early, Horror of Horrors, we have no Red Wine, try to buy some but everywhere that can sell alcohol is shut until 2pm, local law..... I manage to wait until some time after 2pm before entering the local bottle shop, I enter and see a female sat playing with her phone, she has newly inked tattoos on her upper arm, half hidden from view by her dark short sleeved shirt, she looks across at me and our eyes lock on each other, neither one of us gives in, until I say, hi! She replies and looks back at her phone, I walk past her and notice whilst she appears slim, she is a bit bulky around her waist........  I walk around the shop and then come back to where the lone female is sat, I notice the red wine behind her and approach it, once again she locks eyes with me and says, "Do you have any identification on you" at the same time the word Police and the black and white checks on her hat, silently inform me not to be flippant with her.  She explains, it's a spot check on anyone purchasing alcohol and to prevent alcohol abuse, in accordance with the local laws, whereby some people buy beer for other persons to consume, I advise her Its not for me, it's for Julie, which she says it's okay providing it's consumed on the campsite.  I decide not to mention the fact that her, firearm, cuffs, utility pouch and radio, spoil her catwalk figure....

So we retire to the van, pull the curtains and open the vino tinto and as its pay day we check the bank, Gulp, What, You are Kidding Me are some of the expressions I use before instructing her beside me to cut down on her vino intake....... I know I'll check with HMRC and see how my tax rebate is going...... Now you know when your speaking with someone on the phone who obviously can see they have messed up but does not want to admit to it, that is how my conversation goes with a nice, getting nicer by the minute, in between ums, errs and aha's and he will now get in touch with the team dealing with me and get them to phone Australia on a Saturday morning. Best we have a drink.........

    Poorly Froggie 

    Archer Fish

    Kangaroo 007

Turtle Thursday

The day starts off with a Chance meeting with Charlie the buffalo from the Crocodile Dundee film......... He is deceased but stuffed in the Adelaide River pub where we enter for a coffee and information.  You have to hand it to the locals here, they give it to you straight, "Don't bother going there, a waste of time" and so we head off for Mataranka.
It's only just down the road in accordance with Australian standards. Three and a half hours later we arrive after a brief stop en-route for coffee.  It may have chucked it down yesterday with us for an hour but this place must have taken the brunt of it.  Trees are down, water along side of the roads, dead palm fronds all over the place having been pushed by flood water but everything looks cleaner, crisper and fresher.  So we pull into the car park at Mataranka Thermal springs and the couple we have met twice during our travels have already beaten us there....... Lunch is followed by a dip in the spring which is chucking out water that has not seen daylight in the last couple of thousand years.....
Just me and a Aborigine lady in the pool, she actually talks to me and points out a Kangaroo with a joey in its pouch grazing on the riverbank, whilst someone you all know is standing on the other river bank, getting all het up because her camera has just died......
A walk through the forest is dampened when it starts to rain again so off to Bitter Springs.  Rain or no rain, leeches or no leeches, I'm going in, race back to van, collect gear and Splash, absolutely stunning, bluish crystal clear water, green plants, algae, leaves, white roots and turtles, no fish (not enough oxygen in the water) but turtles swimming about in the shadows from the tree overhangs on the embankments..... Having floated along with the current for about 100yards, I get out, leech free and collect towel from my above ground trainer, I take off the rubber bands (just in case of the Candiru fish being present) and rush back to book a camp site so as to have electricity and be able to watch my turtle video, am I excited......... Having never swam with fresh water turtles before or in anything similar to this......... You work it out!
Video not perfect but I still feel a 3 beer night coming on......
Note: The Candiru fish is the one that can swim up your wi**y....... 

    A hole in the ground that produces over a million litres of water a day 

    that is several thousand years old.

    Looking for Turtles!

    Finding Turtles!

    The photo before the Camera died..........

Grey-ate Day

We have survived our night in Crazies Campsite and find for the first morning no sunshine but that the scratching sounds in the night were the wallabies digging through the leaf litter outside, there are dozens of them, most of them bouncing about but some squaring up and what appears to be play fighting but all of them grazing, this place will never have use for a lawn mower.......
Off to Litchfield Park for a day of waterfalls and plunge pools but it got darker and darker, then it was necessary to use the window wipers, we continue to Florence Falls, park up and watch a couple head off to the falls, my take is to put the kettle on and assess the situation.  Two minutes later before the kettle has boiled it is teeming down big time, thunder, lightening and the car park becomes a river. 
Forty five minutes later we get out and set off for Florence Falls, we pass an absolutely soaked couple and ask if it's worth seeing, they are not happy with each other or with my question and choose to ignore us, I smile....... Lots of steps involved so one of us goes down and the other stays at the lookout to take pictures of the one who intends to swim under the waterfall. If you look at the photo carefully and really really study it, it won't matter a jot because I'm behind the over hanging tree, swimming my little heart out, I swam towards the falls for a good ten minutes and managed to get about 15 foot nearer, the current was so strong you swam, and, if you were lucky you stayed in the same place, some foreign guy behind me swore, I think, when he got pushed onto some rocks. I got out totally knac*ered and thought I'll go the pretty way back and avoid the steps...... 
1 kilometre later I come to the river leading to the falls, it's flooded the path, which is now 6 inches under fast flowing water, gulp in for a penny......... I shuffle across with so much debris flowing over my feet I just manage to get across without another A over T moment.
Onto Buley Rockhole, No Way Jose, the rock pools are all overflowing and are just one huge torrent of water that makes them indistinguishable. We meet up with a local professional photographer and together we walk through some overflowing edge bits to see over the top of what are now Rapids....... I'm wearing sports sandals and by the time we get back to the van, my voice is exceptionally high and screaming for a helicopter evacuation, I have removed my left sandal and found my foot one red mass, I have been bitten, you can see the puncture wound pumping out my life giving liquid and what is worse the hideous, slippery, slimy creature is still on my foot.  I tolerate the pain, whilst grappling with the creature and still requesting the flying doctor but we have no phone signal, it then becomes a battle of strength and with the help of kitchen towel I pull the now slightly larger leech off of me and discard him unceremoniously whilst I savour the victory......  
Onto Tolmer Falls, cannot get in the water here in a wheelchair....... so photos taken and onto the big one, Wangi Falls.
Having had my life giving blood drained from me, we decide on lunch first to build up my strength, then off to photograph said falls, walk to the top of them battling through the webs of golden orb spiders and avoiding the falling fruit bat crap......... It has to be done but his time I'm prepared, snorkel, mask and fins and a successful swim over and under the waterfalls and no extra hitch hiking passengers on me when I get out.......
We have stayed too long will not make it to next scheduled location so a quick Ad-lib and we end up at Adelaide River.  Pull into one campsite, sign up saying, gone fishing choose a site and I'll see you later...... Have a look around and reverse out, it looks worse than Crazies from last night, decide to play it safe and use the roadhouse campsite.  We check our phones, we have a signal...........
Phone daughter, whose Birthday it is today and realise whilst we are away enjoying selves, life for those back at home still goes on as normal, no matter if it's good or bad.
So to my Darling Daughter, have a wonderful day and I have just opened a tinnie to toast you, Happy Birthday Xx

    Boxing Wallabies

   Florence Falls, with me behind the tree.....

Tolmer Falls

    Yellow Orb Spider

    For my Sister.........

    Fruit Bats

    Wangi Falls

    Wangi Falls with a little stupid in......

Turn Around and Back we go..........

Three weeks and 5800kms to get here, four days here and today we turn around and start our journey South, hoping to beat the rain and get on the West Coast again before the monsoon/cyclone season really gets underway.  The intention being to call into places we purposely left out on the forward journey.  First stop after being spoken about derogatorily by our camper neighbour, they are a bit  anoraky these camping folk, is the Monsoon National Park, get there and just a few cars in car park BUT all are empty so we feel, we should continue and hopefully the nearest we come to anything Dog related will be Dingos......... 
We know we are the first down this trail as I am breaking all the cobwebs stretched across it, although we did not see a spider all day...... Had a really good day saw another Goanna, lots of various and different birds, saw one of those things with a snout and teeth in a spring with fresh water turtles and rays, hoping to be able to swim with the turtles and rays at another spring on Thursday....... Our favourite moment was around another billabong when we almost stumbled into a Shining Flycatchers nest, all we saw was something golden fly away, cursed because we had not see it beforehand and then found the nest with two eggs in, plotted up and after time both parents took turns returning and sitting on the nest.  Took a bit of time but we eventually got to about 8 feet from them, see photos.
Dehydrated, hungry and tired we decide to still travel further South to Lichfield Park where tomorrow's entertainment is scheduled, water falls and plunge rock pools........
Get to campsite of choice and find it closed but remember going past another one, that had lights on, so drive there.  Could this be a mistake I think as I enter the bar/office, sitting on his own with an empty glass in front of him is a man who obviously has not had enough to do today but possibly too much of what was in the glass, images of a deranged psychotic loner are appearing in my mind and I inadvertently call him Norman Bates....... We deal in cash with no records being made etc park up, we are the only residents except for the wallaby's running around the site, No campsite lights, No TV, No internet and No phone coverage and as darkness descends the trees all start to take on there twilight deformed shapes and only now when together with the mysterious scratching sounds outside do we realise for the first night ever, there is no bird noise whatsoever........ 
One of us has asked three times to ensure the doors are locked, we double check them when suddenly we hear a woman's voice say, "Hello, can you hear me"..............
and Adele's new album starts from the beginning.........

    Daddy

    Mummy

Enough is enough..........

So another early start for those that are not of antipodean descent
but for the locals, G'day, How ya going is the normal way to greet each other at 06.30hrs in the ablutions block........  We are off with the rush hour traffic which is very similar to your local high street traffic in the early hours of the morning, we turn off from going into the city and head to Lee Point, hoping to see Dolphins, Ospreys and Sea Eagles, except we get the family fortunes buzzer, uhh err, tides on its way out. Onto beach talk to local getting bait for his days fishing, he saw two Dolphins playing an hour ago....... No such luck for yours truly after clambering over shell encrusted rocks for an hour..... On way back over said rocks bumped into young family we had met at Lake Argyle, recognised the Bikini she was wearing....... They showed us how to gather, corral and direct, thousands of spider crabs, which to be honest, great fun for kids but once mastered, it was let's take photos of that white thing flying over there.....  Off we go, tele lens at the ready, click.  Quick magnify the image and see what it is, it was at this point we could suddenly hear a buzzing, when the kids had quietened down, it's a bloody remote controlled plane....
Off for some retail therepy to the largest shopping center in Darwin, only where to park, our van is 3.3m high, the car park is 2.2m tall........
TV Ariel, T shirts and shorts purchased whilst downloading Adele's new album, off to Crocodylus Park for Croc feeding and all things Croc, half way there and the van is pulling to the left, fight it as I may, it wants to go, then I realise just gone past Doggin Jungle Park and its Julie pulling on the steering wheel.......
After Crocodylus, we have just about had enough of Crocodile's so head to Nightcliff in hope of seeing anything other than with a bumpy back and loads of teeth but the afternoon storm is approaching.  Out at sea it is dark, except every 10-20 seconds or so, when it is lit up by tremendous fork lightening, we stop at the Beachfront Hotel and ask for a Latte and Orange Juice, sorry Sophia the barmaid says, we don't do coffee....... We do have a free coffee dispenser in the Pokies........ We settle for Coke and a wander about, this hotel is no more than a licensed betting office with six tv screens showing live horse racing, a small room set aside with gaming machines and one arm bandits and another sleazy bar leading to another room with pool tables for the more intellectual......... Come on let's head back, we can watch TV tonight and it's my mothers birthday and no doubt she is all excited and up early awaiting my phone call.........

    Happy Birthday to you

    Happy Birthday dear mother

    Happy Birthday to you

    Sea Eagle