Andy & Gillie's Big Adventure!: Noel Coward was Spot On!

This is an amazing country and WE ARE HAVING AN AMAZING TIME!!! In the vast wilderness that is Northern Territory, internet access is as rare as hen's teeth – hence the long gap between posts. Not sure when I’ll get to post this, but suspect it will be in Kununurra, Sunday 5/10, just over the WA border. Bingeing on fruit & veg as I write this as we’ve just discovered that you can’t take fresh stuff into WA – inc nuts & seeds – and we only filled the (admittedly v small) fridge in Katherine yesterday!

Since our last post, decided to stay a second night in Jabiru, so that we could see the rock paintings at Ubirr, then on to Cooinda, where we went on the Yellow Water cruise and saw lots of different types of birds, plus some serious crocodiles and a beautiful sunset – see pix. Met Derek and Beth Johnson who invited us to stay with them in their 7-bedroom, 1.5 acre property just outside Perth when we arrive. He made a point of giving us his card, so we guess he means it!

On our way to Cooinda we decided to visit a lookout spot (can’t remember the name – sorry). Only 0.6 km from the car parking area – 1.2 km round trip. But it was 1.30 in the afternoon up a rough trail in 40^oheat, with a breeze that was as hot. Mad Dogs and Englishmen indeed!!!

After Cooinda we drove on to Katherine and stayed at a brilliant campsite, where we nearly got Internet – I say nearly as it took an age to open anything and we had to do housekeeping stuff, so didn’t have time to post a blog as I wanted to eat as well!

Northern Territory landscape around these parts comprises hundreds of kilometres of pale straight road bordered by red dirt, scrubby, white trees with thin green canopies offering no shade, turning black at times as the bush fires attack, seemingly randomly and without warning. But the trees keep on growing, as do the palms and other vegetation in this wilderness. We were vicariously excited for a short while by a small range of small hills – Gregory National Park – which the Territorians in their folly choose to call mountains (as if!). Also some seriously interesting trees – Boabs – up to 1000 years old some of them and enormous girth. They look dead, but come to flower and leaf in the Wet– I think the designer for Game of Thrones had seen a few of these.

This unforgiving, searingly hot landscape is dotted with thousands of little red mounds – from 20 cm to one metre in height, looking like sloppy pillars of maroon ice cream – built by Cathedral Termites. Back in Kakadu these structures reach up to 4 metres and are a yellow ochre colour. Over this side they are darker and smaller…

Katherine to Timber Creek was largely uneventful, except that we stopped at our first Roadhouse for coffee and discovered the perfect place to have yogurt and honey for lunch – see pic! As we drove into the campsite, our milometer (is that right?) clicked over to 000.0 – we had just completed our first 1000 kilometres! Only 11000??? more to go in Oz (educated/wild guess – delete as appropriate).

We celebrated by watching crocs being fed and having an ice cream! Dinner of salad, salad, salad and salad awaits…

After a breakfast of fruit, fruit and fruit, had a long drive (230 km) to cross the border into WA, stopping at a rest spot to devour more salad and fruit. Met a very chatty couple, Sheila (I kid you not) and Theo who were also heading for Perth and guzzling remaining fruit etc. Gave us lots of tips about places on the west coast. (Whisper - smuggled onions, garlic, ginger and a full jar of honey into WA – don’t tell anyone!) Arrived in Kununurra with an extra 1.5 hours to kill!

Got a site overlooking Lake Kununurra and found internet, so we should be posting this on Sunday evening. Problems with wifi, so Monday morning now - just had a swim, shower and healthy breakfast and off to Lake Argyle for the infinity pool - life's tough…