Diggers Rest

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DAY 262

I woke up to the sound of car engines, Andy too was awake outside we see two cars (one sounded like a V8) cruising around the campsite. They are obviously up to no good; all sensible campers are safely tucked up in bed whether it be motorhome, caravan or tent. I wonder if they are looking for trouble or a place to sit up drinking for the rest of the night, realising that there is no room we soon hear them drive off.

Andy is up and at it this morning as we are packing up and leaving Lichfield National Park, which is sad, as it is a great place but hey that’s the way it has to be. I tidy up the bed and start to zip up the inner windows as outside ropes are being undone and poles and pegs are been taken away.

Just to clarify to our readers our trailer tent, is stand alone you just fold it open, but you need to peg the profile of the floor out to maximise its shape and as we like all the large flap area’s open they can either be rolled up to the top or stretched out with poles and ropes so the act as sunshades and offer a little bit of privacy.

Whilst taking bits and pieces down Andy puts the kettle on, and also boils some water in a billy for boiled eggs, the packing away is soon done, so after a shortish breakfast we are ready for the off.

We go and say good by to Janet and Keith our next door neighbours who we have enjoyed their company, and after kisses and handshakes we are off, its now 9.20.

On to the bitumen, the day is gorgeous and warm already, and we are on route to Katherine about 300k’s away.

Whilst driving out of Litchfield with Andy driving I wait for the laptop to boot up, I clean the dead bugs off the screen and the keyboard, I then patiently await the appearance of a green bar or two for internet access, so that I can log onto the Big 4 website and book a campsite at Katherine Low Level for a couple of nights. Soon I am in, the booking is successful, we don’t have to worry about where we will sleep tonight, and we can just turn up later. I log into KangarooJack to check on stats and upload a blog, we are thrilled to see that we have 4 messages so a whoop for joy echoes around the inside of the truck.

I left a message on Bill Kelly’s phone telling him we had left Litchfield and that we would be in Katherine tonight, if they were anywhere near we could meet up in the next few days. We had expected them to be at Daly Waters last night so fingers crossed. They have travelled up the centre via Alice Springs and Uluru heading into Darwin, they emailed a while ago to let us know they were on the road again for another adventure and of course in the hope that our paths would cross.

You may remember if you have been reading the blog, that way back in January (19th to be exact) we met Bill and Janet Kelly when we were camping in the Warrumbungle National Park, in New South Wales. Bill and Janet were there with one of their daughters and her family, we all had a brilliant time, they are very kind people and Bill was the one that offered us some excellent advice on buying a book called Camps 5, if we only knew then how important this book would be to us.

We pull in to Batchelor for Diesel, and just top the main tank up buy a couple of Latte’s and a couple of Beef Pies and head off again, whilst I am in the servo Andy is uploading the blog for 261 “Blow Ants off Before Eating”, I am waiting for a while as they are struggling with the coffee machine, but as I get back he has done most of it and we only have some photo’s to do. Which can be done on route, especially as we have a good aerial for the Internet fitted on the truck it gives us quite a good range (providing hills don’t get in the way).

We stop at Adelaide River and visit the War Cemetery. We find beautiful lush grounds that are seemingly watered continuously. The Frangipani adorns the skyline and oversees the hundreds of graves below. There is a splendid amount of colour for the time of year and lots of tender loving care can be seen in these grounds as a respectful resting place of these men and women who fought a war for us. The grounds are so tranquil and a place of quiet contemplation.

I wander around to take some pictures and look for a specific headstone, I step forward to picture the huge cross on the cenotaph and find the only patch of mud in the whole cemetery, my flip flop is suctioned off my foot as a huge splurge of mud shoots up the backs of my legs.

Back on the road again and on the way to Pine Creek we see a Willy Willy form on the side of the road, (Mini Tornado) this is a fairly big one and unfortunately it comes right across the road as we drive into it, we are shrouded in dust, leaves and any other cr*p that it has picked up, we can both feel the force of the wind as we drive through, Andy grips the steering wheel tightly, the trailer moves from side to side but luckily we are easily out on the other side.

The rest of our journey is quite uneventful, except when we are about 20k’s from Katherine we turn off the main highway towards Edith Falls to go and have a look, as its only 29k’s up the Bitumen. We park the truck amongst all the other trailers, campers and off road adventure vehicles and go and have a walk, Edith falls is a very large swimming hole fed by a waterfall, there are half a dozen people having a dip In this safe pool, though there is a notice saying there is always a possibility that Crocodiles “may” get in the swimming hole and you are swimming at your own risk. Still that didn’t seem to deter the bathers already in there.

We are more interested in looking for snakes on this lovely afternoon and we are disappointed that we don’t see any. I think we have been really lucky to have seen the 4 snakes we have on this trip. People really do think there are snakes everywhere in Australia, which is so not the case, you have to be really lucky to see one close up and really unlucky to be bitten by one though obviously it does happen.

Back in the truck we are heading back to the highway and after turning left we have our last 20k’s before we hit Katherine, Caroline down loads all the images to our lap top from our camera’s and clears the cards ready for another days photography tomorrow.

We are soon pulling in to The Big 4 at Katherine where we have stayed before and enjoyed. Caroline jumps out and is unusually a long time, booking in at reception, when she comes back she tells me that we have a site but it is unpowered, as all the powered sites are gone, I ask what about our booking but it seems they don’t tend to look at the on line books when they are dishing out the sites as needed (technology is a wonderful thing but always fails when Humans get involved). This is in complete contrast to the Big 4 at Howard Springs who seem to let the Internet control their bookings.

Still we have got a site, unpowered, but it does not matter as we have enough power in the Patrol to run the fridge for a few days and certainly power the laptop from the Power Gorilla.

The first job Andy wants to do before we set the trailer up is to give it a good clean, the top zip on cover which is grey is an orangey red, from all the dust we have collected at many of Australia’s most beautiful destinations, he parks by one of the many hoses that are scattered about fills the washing up bowl full of water adds a little floor cleaner and sets to cleaning the trailer. While Andy washed the trailer, I went to the camp kitchen to make a cup of tea and plug the mobile phone in for some power to listen to messages and find out where Bill and Janet are. I find that they arrived in Katherine yesterday, hoping that they are still here I leave a telephone message.

I wander back over to Andy with the Tea and tell him about the phone messages, just as I am explaining about Bill the phone rings again, it’s Bill, they are still in Katherine so we make arrangements to meet up tonight.

Within an hour the trailer is looking great again, so we pull it to its new dry camp spot and set it up. We showered and awaited the arrival of Bill and Janet.

The blog’s we wrote when we were in the Warrumbungle National Park as listed below, THEY ARE SOME GREAT BLOG ENTRIES, I particularly like Dinner with Friends,

The Honeymooner 21st Jan - Day 75
The Bread Knife 20th Jan - Day 74
Has Anyone Spotted any Koalas Recently 19th Jan - Day 73
Dinner With Friends 18th Jan - Day 72

It was like we had only seen them 5 minutes ago, falling back in to old conversations and the like, we asked after their family and they were all getting on well.

The evening was starting to set in so we all headed off to a pub nearby called the Diggers Rest where we had dinner and what a great time we had, incidentally it is actually the first Australian pub that we have been into.

Last orders at the bar are called at 10.00, Bill pops up to buy as all another drink before we go our separate ways, I have another gin and tonic, except when Bill returns it does not taste like gin and tonic. Bill takes it back to query it, he is told that it is not Gordon’s it is a brand called Vickers, (they ran out of Gordon’s) so it is actually a gin and tonic. I have never heard of Vickers, the bar maid tells us it is actually from England, if that is the case I have never seen it, perhaps it is just for export. Remember that great advertising slogan “It’s got to be Gordon’s.”

Tomorrow night we are going to Bill and Janet’s camp as they have offered to do a curry for us both. It is way past our bedtime so we part company outside the Diggers Rest with the promise of a good meal tomorrow night.

So on this still fairly warm, but refreshingly cooler night, until tomorrow we will bid you a good night.

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Photos

Peacocks
Roam The grounds