Borroloola

Now settled (briefly) in Katherine, after four nights in Borroloola, and a night at a bush campsite on the Towns River equidistant (300km) from the two nearest towns (Borroloola and Katherine). After nine nights in our tent, we’ve lashed out on a motel and a restaurant meal – and it’s rather nice.

Borroloola was a wonderful experience. It’s a really interesting town – somewhere about 1000 people, more than 80% of whom are from the four aboriginal clans or the Gulf region. Most of the town is spread out along the one long main street, though a lot of houses are on the other side of the causeway across the river, which means that they can be isolated for weeks at a time during the wet. We brought two days of light rain to the town – the first time any locals can remember it raining in August for more than a decade.

Since last year the pub no longer has a liquor licence – and apparently the town has improved markedly a result. Even the amusingly named ‘Bulk Discount Store’ (which sells small amounts of groceries at wildly inflated prices) only sells cartons of mid-strength beer (and no wine or spirits) – and then only for three hours a day.

The white community are mostly either connected with the huge pastoral stations around the area, the McArthur River zinc mine, government services or the big community of feral fishermen who frequent the estuaries all around the Gulf.

We managed to time our visit to coincide with the Borroloola Show, the Borroloola Rodeo, and a first-ever performance by the Darwin Symphony Orchestra in Borroloola. We met a number of really interesting people, each of whom taught us something of value:

• Bob and Beryl taught us the virtue of patience, having been stranded in Borroloola for three weeks while a problem with their car was diagnosed. By the time we left the car was still not roadworthy, and had been shipped to Mt Isa (about 1000km away!) for more repairs. Through all of this they’ve been calmly philosophical, befriending and helping everyone who passed through the camping ground.
• Daryl, Fred and Sharyn taught us about the subtle art of rodeo, horses and bush friendliness. Daryl now deals horses at Ipswich, after a career in rodeo, horse-breaking and droving all around the country (including the Tumbarumba Rodeo!) Daryl ended up taking charge of the chutes at the Borroloola Rodeo – which he describes as the most disorganised bush rodeo ever – and one of the most enjoyable.
  
• Alison, who has spent a number of years working first in health and then in education services in remote NT communities. She reckons she’s now visited pretty much every community and outstation in the Territory, and has some pretty amazing and strong insights into how much variety there is between communities, and what life is really like in the most remote parts of the NT.
• Warren Snowdon (local MHR for the electorate of Lingiari) and his staffer Vince, who explained why their NT electorate, which takes in all of the NT except for Darwin, and also the Christmas and Cocos Islands, is very different to every other electorate in the country.
• Bob from Bushfires NT, who explained why almost all of the country we’d seen around the Gulf has been recently burnt, and what ‘mosaic burning’ is all about. (Near Wollogorang Station we had passed through a large out-of-control blaze, with no-one but us there to witness it. It turned out that Bob knew about this fire, which he said had been started by a party of drunken blokes at a bush camp somewhere, and all that he could do was to monitor it from satellite imagery as it burnt itself out.)

After leaving Borroloola we visited Caranbirini, which is a beautiful little park with ‘bee-hive’ formations of red sandstone like a mini-Bungle Bungle, and then another few hundred km of dirt up to the Towns River, where we camped beside the river and saw our first croc! At Roper Bar we bought petrol at $1.98 per litre. Astro Boy has done 4,500km so far, including over 1000km on some occasionally challenging dirt – and we’re yet to get a puncture… (famous last words?)

Today we’re doing a cruise at Katherine Gorge, and preparing to start a long walk tomorrow through the Nitmiluk National Park (we may do the five days of the full Jatbula Trail). Life is good.

Into the NT

Left Lawn Hill yesterday after four nights, a little sorry to leave as we’d had such a good time there. A bit late getting away, as people came to say goodbye to us, have a chat and exchange contact details etc. Very friendly place.

Karen got know a lot of other people in the camping ground, partly because our campsite was by the river, 200 metres from the amenities block, and there was a confusingly large number of passage ways through the trees, only one of which led to the amenities, and all of which looked pretty the same at night time. One night she was gone for a VERY LONG TIME. When she returned she had met most everyone in the camping ground, as well as many in the caravan park next door, crashed through trees and bushes, walked into the low fence that stops people falling into the river, and finally [I claim the fading light on my headlamp and a few glasses of fine white Riesling as contributing factors – KM] got a complete stranger to walk her home. Next day we set up the GPS with waypoints for “TENT” and “AMEN” to help with navigation. The designers of GPS system probably hadn’t anticipated this application of the technology, but it proved very effective. (If it hadn’t worked, she planned to set out the next night with the EPIRB as well).

Writing this from a bush campsite beside the Calvert River, about halfway around the Gulf of Carpentaria, about 300km from Burketown and 200km from Borroloola, the two nearest towns. There’s palm trees, red-tailed black cockatoos, lorikeets, blue-winged kookaburras, and a menagerie of other birds we haven’t yet identified. Warning signs about estuarine crocodiles, but we haven’t seen one yet…

We’re really roughing it out here. Last night after a sunset walk to photograph the birds we had a rustic dinner of scotch fillet, potatoes mashed with crème fraiche, snow peas, fresh mushrooms and onions, washed down with a bottle of aged Hunter Valley Semillon. A hot shower using our new little 12volt water pump (thank you, Scott!), and retired to bed, feeling very pleased with ourselves.

Lawn Hill National Park

Sitting in the mid-afternoon shade under palm trees at Lawn Hill, a national park in the far north-west of Qld. Hopefully I will be able to load this to our little blog this afternoon, as to our surprise the Adel’s Grove camping area where we’re staying offers Internet access (computer not provided) via a satellite phone connection at a ‘flat rate’of $5, with apparently no time limit…

It got up to 38 degrees this morning, which we spent paddling a canoe up the beautiful Lawn Hill Gorge, having lunch at the permanent spring at the source of the gorge. Big red cliffs over the narrow gorge, rainforest along the edges and masses of birds. It’s very beautiful, and quite an oasis in the midst of some fairly remote and arid country around. There’s even crocodiles (just the innocuous fresh-water variety) – but we haven’t seen any yet.

It was a 420 km drive up here from Cloncurry, through Quamby, the Burke and Wills Roadhouse and the settlement of Gregory. Gregory has a population of 25, which makes it the biggest town between here and Cloncurry, and the 2^nd largest town in the entire 40,000 sq km Burke Shire (total population: 400).

We were in Gregory for five minutes when a Land Cruiser pulled over and Brendan asked us: “Would youse two be looking for a coupla days’work?” Brendan (plus Sally and children) are fencing contractors up here for a few months – and he must be pretty desperate for help! We politely declined and then had a good long conversation about everything. He was pretty scathing about Canberra and public servants, so I told him I worked for the Tax Office and asked if he’d been audited lately. Two days later after coming back after a bushwalk we found the words “Tax Man!” written in the dust on the side window of our car!

Meeting lots of interesting and friendly people as we travel, all sharing advice, information and stories about where they’ve been and asking for information about places down the road. Most of them are older than us, and most are travelling much more elaborately than us, with big 4WDs, campervans, trailer-campers and caravans. It’s been funny seeing little Astro Boy sitting in some parking areas, with every other vehicle looking much bigger than him.

A couple, Keith and Linda, from Mareeba that we met while hiking yesterday – he is a retired entomologist, and they both have a great knowledge about the flora and fauna of this area. Tomorrow we’re going to share a vehicle with them on a tour down to the Riversleigh fossil site, 50km south of here.

Then we’re off on Wednesday on the road up through the Aboriginal settlement of Doomadgee, and west around the Gulf to Borroloola. It’s a long drive so we’ll take two days with an overnight camp beside the road somewhere. No settlements after Doomadgee, no petrol, lots of creek crossings all rough dirt between them, so hopefully with out one spare tire we’ll get through OK. We have heard of people last week coming through there with two tires stuffed full of spinifex!

Day Six: Longreach – Cloncurry

We’ve quickly realised that it won’t be feasible to do daily updates on our travels. Too many things happening, not always got the time, electricity, light or energy to write up highlights. Not to mention VERY little access to the Internet i.e. this is the first time…

So, with the blog, we hope to just sketch out an outline of where we’ve been, and put in a few highlights and observations – and maybe a few photos as well…

Staying overnight in the Leichhardt Hotel in Cloncurry after three nights camping at Longreach. Travelled over 2000km already, and seen a LOT of country. Much of it flat flat flat, with subtly changing vegetation. It has actually got better as we’ve travelled north.

Camels alongside the road between Nyngan and Bourke. In Charleville we saw bilbies and yellow-footed rock wallabies at the national park HQ, and our first Major Mitchell Cockatoo outside of town. We must have seen a thousand dead roos alongside the road so far (no exaggeration).

In Longreach we did the obligatory visit to the Stockmen’s Hall of Fame, but didn’t get inducted. It was actually a little disappointing (not sure what we expected) apart from a very entertaining demonstration of skills by ‘Rusty’ the drover.

Visited the Qantas Founders Museum, and did the full 747 tour, including climbing down into the cargo bays and out onto the wing.

Shared Longreach with the Variety Club’s Sydney to Darwin Bash, with 105 very old and outrageously decorated cars travelling up the dirt to Darwin. They closed the main street of Longreach for a street party to mark the occasion, and we met some very interesting people…

Planned to go the Mt Isa Rodeo, but no accommodation (even campsites) to be had. Instead we’re going north towards the Gulf today, and planning to stay four nights at the Lawn Hill National Park – gorges, birds, bushwalks, and the famous Riversleigh fossil site. Then (if Astro Boy is up to it and we can get enough petrol), up through Burketown and west around the Gulf into the NT and to Borroloola in time for their annual show and rodeo on the 17^th.

All is well, having an excellent time so far, and (almost) getting into the relaxed holiday state we have anticipated.

Day One

Got away eventually at 9:15, after a huge-ish day yesterday getting organised, doing all the important things like cleaning the bathrooms, vacuuming, washing clothes, getting our mail redirected, suspending gym membership, completing outstanding work commitments, buying 24 bottles of suitable wine to take away, washing ironing and packing clothes, sorting out supplies and equipment, writing to all the neighbours, etc – you get the idea. It was a busy day and it was nearly midnight when we finished up and collapsed.

Great day’s travelling, though we are going to take some time to get used to the fact that we actually on eight weeks’ of holiday, have no commitments to work or anyone else, and only have to focus on enjoying ourselves and making the most of our travels… It’ll be tough but we think that, given time, we might get used to it.

Journey highlights of day one – which took us from Canberra through Yass, Boorowa, Cowra, Canowindra, Eugowra, Parkes, Narromine, Trangie, and Nevertire to Nyngan:

• Having to stop on the Barton Highway so that two ducks could cross the road. Traffic backed up for a little while and no-one complained or showed impatience.
• How good the country looks at the moment. Last time we came through this route the drought was in full flight, and it looked like a moonscape in places. This time it was green green green and wet, with chains of ponds and pools of water spilling out of the soil at several places. It’s hard to believe that it could even come back from the previous desolation, but there is clearly great resilience in this landscape…
• A couple of clever shop signs – the Deli Lama delicatessen in Canowindra and the Cobb & Dough bakery in Eugowra for starters.
• The football match in progress when we arrived here in Nyngan. Almost nobody was sitting in the stands (too cold!), but were sitting in their cars in a circle around the ground, pointing their cars front ends at the action. Whenever there was a score or something of significance happened, there would be a chorus of car horns all sounding their approval (or disapproval – it was hard to tell which). Not sure who won in the end, but it was entertaining.
• Our current home at the Riverside Camp Ground, on the edge of Nyngan and also the Bogan River (which is replete with water – but not threatening to flood as it did with devastating effect in 1994.

Bob and Anne Jolliffe own and run the camping ground here, and moved here some time ago from Toronto (NSW, that is). They are great lovers of animals in all forms, and the camping ground is a tribute this passion, and part nature park. As well as Dino the soccer-playing dog, there is Eric the white emu, several orphaned Eastern Grey joeys. Turkeys that go jogging alongside Bob when he bicycles around the park, Pepi and Thomas T the cats, possums, budgies and a catalogue of around 200 species of native birds that have been found to frequent this little riverside oasis.

In our little sunset walk along the river bank we saw magpie larks, galahs, grass parrots, purple swamp hens, coots, crows, (very large) willie-wagtails, budgies – and turkeys…

Ready to go...

Astro Boy is ready to go. He's got new shoes (well, tyres), he's been serviced and washed, he's got a full tank of petrol, and he's chomping at the bit in the driveway. Just another 12,000km and he'll be back here again.

Godzilla is waiting by the door to make sure that he doesn't get left behind. He's planning to RAAHHHHH!!! at a crocodile, but we don't know if that's really such a good idea.

Karen and John on the other hand, are nowhere near ready. Karen's catching up on ABS work before she goes, and John's struggling to sort out which camera gear to leave behind (probable answer: none of it). Minor logistics like food, clothes, camping gear are yet to get much attention.

All going well, we'll be on our way to Nyngan by 8am tomorrow, so we'd better get cracking eh?