After sitting up until 2am last
night, cursing the blog and the internet connection, I finally went to bed and
got a fairly good sleep – it was much warmer in bed than out. On our way out of town this morning we first
checked out the jewellery store across the road from the pub (which has an old
helicopter sitting on its roof), followed by a drive to the Stuart Tree. This tree is famous as John McDouall Stuart carved an “S” in this tree (now only a
tree-truck) in 1861-2 when he made the first successful journey from Adelaide
to Darwin. Not far from here is an old
Qantas hanger. The airport here at Daly Waters
was the first international airport in Australia. However, with the outbreak of WWII, a change
of roles came to this aerodrome. It was
after this that the airport was expanded and became a military base. Onward we then drove along the Stuart Highway
until we reached Mataranka, our stop-over for the night. We pulled into the Mataranka Homestead Resort,
which is situated in Elsey National Park and is well-known for its Thermal Springs. We settled in and quickly got changed heading
for a dip in the lovely warm spring fed thermal waters. The temperature is a lovely 34 degrees and
the water itself is crystal clear. Many
of the resident peacocks and wallabies came to visit us at dinner tonight. First were the peacocks who we fed the scrap
celery and corn kernels and later came lots of friendly wallabies. We opened up a packet of milk arrowroot
biscuits and had a few ourselves and
then spent ages feeding the rest of the packet to the wallabies; they were adorable. At one point the wallabies were even holding
Zoe’s hand while they ate their biscuits.
The following day we spent quite
a few hours doing boring schoolwork with the kids. They started out pretty good and got some
work done but by the end we were having our usual arguments. It has to be the worst part of our trip! I had allocated the drama segment to Josh to
get done with the kids… not a great idea.
Josh’s acting was ok but the kids didn’t put much effort into it and
Josh wasn’t about to push too hard. Oh
well, it’s now done and gone – I can’t see the kids having an acting career at
the end of their schooling careers. It
was fairly late this afternoon when we decided that they’d actually done enough
work, so Josh took them back to the thermal springs for a dip while I just
cleaned up the van a bit. After dinner
tonight we ducked over to the reception area where again we had some free
entertainment. A gentleman singing with
his guitar and didgeridoo and again this guy was pretty good. After a few drinks we returned to the van and
invited our new neighbours over for a drink.
Matt & Elissa had just put their kids Mitch (8) and Anna (6) to
bed and we sat around enjoying a few
drinks and some great laughs with them.
Tuesday morning we decided to
have another sneaky break from school and head into town to check out the
barramundi feeding and more springs .
Our new friends, the Hirst’s, thankfully decided to join us for the fun
today. The kids were off to a slow start
in becoming friends but it didn’t take long before they were really enjoying
themselves. After a quick stop for my morning
coffee, both Zoe and Samantha got in the gorgeous big pond with the floating
pink lilies and tried their hand at fish feeding. There were only about half a dozen barras but
they were each a good size. As the girls
dropped their hand down just above the water, the barras warily approached and
made a big “snap” taking the fish from their hands. They were harmless in their taking but they
really gave us a shock each time they took their food and made a mighty big
splash and they turned and took off after taking the food. It was a bit of fun. Next we left here and went to Bitter Springs
for a swim. Again, the water was a
lovely temperature and very clean and clear.
Upon recommendation from talking to others, we took our snorkels and
masks / goggles with us and it was so well worth the underwater viewing. It was just like an underwater garden with
lots to see. The kids were a bit irked
by the bits of moss floating about but they eventually got used to it and
happily floated down the stream a few times…. it was very relaxing, warm and
simply divine. We stopped in at the
local store before we headed back to the caravan park, had a bit of lunch and
eventually the kids got stuck back into a little bit of schoolwork, even though
it is never enough. We relaxed this
afternoon with further drinks and great conversation with the Hirst’s whilst
the kids relaxed in the van watching a movie together. Our wallaby friends from last night returned after
dinner tonight requesting a few more biscuits and we were happy to oblige –
that was until the bossy male came along.
No harm done but he certainly was assertive.
