Blogs from Mataranka, Northern Territory, Australia, Oceania - page 5

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka June 10th 2009

Hi from Mataranka Since leaving Mt Isa we have travelled west, then eventually north after a short detour south! We spent 2 nights at a lovely Free Park beside the Georgina River at Camooweal. There were lots of different types of birds, some quite big, including broglia, hawks, and some small, including budgies. We used our new camp oven each night to cook our dinner with great success. The sunsets and sunrises were great too. After that we drove west, crossing into Northern Terroritory and putting our watches forward - there is now 2 1/2 hours difference with NZ. Our next night was spent at the camping ground behind Barkley Homestead. We took advantage of their cheap roast beef dinners. After that we headed west to Three ways and met the Stuart Highway which comes up ... read more

Day fourteen Evening

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka September 26th 2008

13 to 13

We have frogs. Rohan.... read more

Into the bush: Kakadu National Park-Tennants Creek

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka August 2nd 2008

After a hefty climb

Olliep

The next morning we were awoken by our 'neighbours' shouting at us. They were kind enough to inform us that we were lazy and missing the best part of the day. Breakfast was cooked on the fire once again and we enjoyed noodles with boiled egg - A cheap and interesting alternative to a sausage and egg mcmuffin. We packed up our camp and headed on around 9.30am towards Pine Creek. It turned out that it was a one road town consisting of a garage and a toy shop that sold alcohol! From there we made progress towards Edith Falls where we had a swim in the icy cold lake and a brief wash of certain items. We were now getting more adventurous and had a lunch of freshly cooked sausage sandwiches with cup'o'soup! In the ... read more

Travel Blog 7 to 13 July(Alice Springs-Uluru-Renner Springs)

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka July 14th 2008

Uluru

benson

Problem last evening-no internet reception so this is a day late.What a great week we have had.Been down to Ayers Rock/Uluru and back to pick up our (serviced) caravan from Alice Springs and headed north to Mataranka which is near Katherine-we are less than 500kms from Darwin and it is warming up-up to 30 degrees today.The 5 days camping around Uluru were memorable for many reasons,not the least being that while at Yulara resort campground(20km from Uluru) the night temp. was 1 degree each of the 3 nights.We were very brave in our not very thick sleeping bags.The days were 20 degrees and lovely but those nights!We can well understand the reasons why Uluru is such a sacred and special place for the Aboriginals.We felt its mystique also.Couple of photos-one the famous sunset view(we watched the ... read more

Nearing the end of tour

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka May 20th 2007

jenny234

Thermal pools, very nice, we had a couple of long days on the coach , stopped at Daly Waters pub too. We went for a cruise on the Katherine Gorge which was spectacular. didnt see croc's but saw little waterfalls and chilled out on the boat for a bit. We drove up to Jabiru and stopped at Edith falls for dinner, had a nice swim in the pool, was a long way from the bank to the falls but worth the effort. We then did a Senic flight over Jim Jim and Twin falls which was really good, amazing view over the falls, so glad we did it. We did an aboriginal cruise in the afternoon learning about the culture and the way the survive using the trees and plants. In the afternoon we went to ... read more

Mataranka to Borroloola

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka August 17th 2006

Cutta Cutta Caves

Rimmont

Day 137 Thursday 17 August 2006 Katherine to Mataranka We only drove about 100 km’s today to Mataranka via Cutta Caves which are limestone caves which host rare host bats. We never saw any but very pretty crystals amongst the stalactities and stalagmites. Mataranka is renowned for the famous thermal pools and the town of “We of the Never Never” book. We visited “Bitter Springs” which is a hot springs that is 32 degrees. Beautiful surroundings with all palm trees around and very deep. These have been only recently opened. Well over Graeme and my head. There were three caravan parks in town and all below average. Graeme checked into the only one that had a pool but when they went to see it there was all slime over it and covered with small bugs. Needless ... read more

Mataranka Hot pools

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka November 21st 2005

The bats

becfleur

Imagine driving in 40degree heat with no air con in middle of nothingness singing to yourselves because the crap pink cd player chews through batteries like nobodys business in two Cds (was cheapest thing and even had microphone with it which was thrown out). Jessies favourite comment being 'theres water there' as not used to seeing much water and both of us falling asleep in passenger side. Then sweaty and exhausted you stumble on this a tropical spring where the oficers of the army used to chill out. Surrounded by noises of crickets, flying foxes (bats), and water trickling! The water was clear and we were in heaven. Only after going to Lichfield was this place not loved as much as it had something fairly fake about it..... unsure what but it would have been tampered ... read more

Hello-finally

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka July 26th 2005

Wilpena Pound

Doydie

Hey everybody, We finally found a computer that we can upload images with…..but don’t try to use the internet at caravan parks, internet cafes or public libraries because they won’t let you. What you need to do is find a family like the Gridleys, use their CDMA internet connection to their laptop and then send. Simple really. Now we have two scenarios: 1. Stalk the Gridleys across the country so that we can do a third page of this blog or, 2. We haven’t come up with scenario 2 yet but it’s only July. Luckily the Gridley's have been fnatastic to travel with and the kids have really enjoyed having someone to hang out with at the next caravan park. Oh....Colin's beer also is not bad either. So far, so good. We set off about a ... read more

"it doesn't get much better than this" (in an Australian accent)

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Mataranka August 31st 2004

claveles

We left the bustiling metropolis of Alice Springs on Monday. I'm not sure if i mentioned this but it was cold and raining in Alice Springs. Alice is in the middle of the driest part of the outback. Everyone who lived there was happy to see the rain, they've been a a drought for a few years, but still funny that it rained while we were there. Rachel, Uwe (pronounced oo-ver)and i got on the bus. Uwe has been with us since we left Adelade. He's german and fairly quiet. We know very little about him, but he is good company, really nice (he burned our photos onto cd's for us) and fun to have on bus trips. Tim, our guide, resembles Crocadile Dundee a bit. A country Aussie bloke, and as the trip went on ... read more

Brief history of Australia

Aboriginal settlers arrived on the continent from Southeast Asia about 40,000 years before the first Europeans began exploration in the 17th century. No formal territorial claims were made until 1770, when Capt. James COOK took possession in the name...more history

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