What a Kak!!!!!

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Well we did it. We made it to Kakadu.....And what an adventure it wasn’t.

After arriving on Wednesday afternoon at approximately 1.30 pm and unpacking the van and getting organised we wandered into the Visitors Centre and had a good look around. This place was well appointed and had a heap of information, plenty of displays to view along with some interactive bits and pieces for the kids to touch and feel and look at.

With information gathered for our future viewing pleasure, we then inquired about the whereabouts of their Mobil service station for us to get Autogas for the car (due to the car being dedicated Gas only, no option of using petrol). Before leaving Melbourne we had been doing our homework to ensure that where ever we were going we would be able to obtain Gas within a 200km distance top up along our journey. Checking on all petrol station websites and on the LPG website, we knew it was available from Mobil in Jabiru. With all our checks and balances in place, we made our way knowing that the Mobil servo was our lifeline...Surely you can see where this is going... The kind staff at the Visitor centre politely informed us that the only servo in Jabiru was a BP (the one that we had already visited) and found that they did not have Autogas, (the BP was formally known as Mobil about a year ago and during the changeover they decided in their wisdom not to bother with Autogas - yeh for us!!!!). We then stated......”F&#k!!!! What do we do now?”

For a while we sat with our dumb expressions, looking at each other and wondering where the Hell we went wrong and thinking who we can beat up and take our frustrations out on. We had travelled from Darwin to Kak for 3+ hours on our full tank, towing the van which does eat a fair bit of fuel, fully aware that we could fill up again when we arrived. Looking at our fuel consumption and making further inquiries to the closest town with gas, we were then informed that to get Gas we would need to go to Katherine (300+kms away) or back to Darwin (250kms away). We could not believe this as we had less than 190kms left in the tank to get us anywhere to refuel but regardless, we were bound to come up short. Somehow this just wasn’t gonna work!!!

After checking all other options, including torching the town to the ground, we decided that the only (the best being burning the place to the ground) course of action was to chance a drive back to Humpty Doo; about 200km back towards Darwin without the caravan, to fill up if available there. We were pretty sure we had seen Autogas there when we travelled past on our Croc tour on Gmans birthday. If this worked out Ok, this would then allow us to drive back to Jabiru where the van was waiting patiently for us, using less fuel, leaving more fuel in the tank to tow the caravan back out of Jabiru...and nothing else!!!! No sight-seeing could be done, nothing other than sitting at the park for the next 2 days!!!! What a thrill!!!! So, we found every container or bottle that could hold drinking water, found the aeroguard and also put as much food that would not go off in the hot car just in case we ended up stuck on the side of the road for a few days. At 4.30pm, we packed the kids into the car for the journey back to Humpty Doo paying extra special attention on the fuel gauge.

Finally we arrived in Humpty Doo some time after 7.00pm and gratefully filled up the tank, while contemplating wringing out the hose to ensure we had every last bit of gas before heading back to Jabiru. As we’d basically been on the road all day and knew we would miss out on dinner, we decided to get some takeaway meals from the local pub before heading back to camp. What a great idea!!!!! We’d been made aware of dress standards in the NT as they are trying to smarten the place up (signs outside pubs declare that patrons need to have showered before service will be granted), so we were a little surprised to see the dress code of this pub. There was one bloke standing at the bar with a pair of shorts, and thongs and that was it. He was about 50+ years old, 25+ stone including beer gut and a going grey Mohawk....(obviously not one that’s going old gracefully) so I decided to wait for him to finish his long chat before ordering.....As they say, Humpty See, Humpty Doo.

While waiting for our order we sat in their “beer garden”, a large concrete structure with a tin roof, and watched other locals interact. Lisa observed one bloke, absolutely smashed, flick a cigarette at a group of people then, when confronted, jump on his quad bike with beer stein in one hand, fag hanging out of his mouth, do a burnout in the carpark (next to our car) then zoom off into the night. Our dinner arrived around this time and so it was definitely a good time for us to leave and eat our takeaway in the car on the way back. The drive back was fairly non-eventful apart from spotting a couple of dingoes and our first “live” kangaroo (not roadkill....) and we finally got back around 10.30pm. We decided that the following day would need to be extra special because of this muck up and were discussing the option of going over Kak in a light plane as a surprise for the girls. This way we could actually say we had seen Kakadu from the air instead. Well, that was day one finished.....or so I thought!!!

About 2.30am I awoke with a pain in the stomach and thought I’d better head over to the toilet block. At this point I could probably spare you all the awkward details however suffice to say that at 7.00am I was still at the toilet block having emptied my stomach from every orifice (including my ears I reckon at one point....) I was literally a very sick man and the cleaner handed his notice in at 8.00am!!!!! I reckon it must have been the burger I got from our friends at HD pub which really surprises me as I thought they were famous for its burgers (or at least that’s what the sign said out front....)
After the girls and I arose the next morning to the news that daddy had the “spurts and squirts “and us not being able to go anywhere (plane flight not gonna happen) or do anything with the car it was decided that the day for the Vanin-Smith girls was best utilised by the pool giving dad a good chance to catch up on some zzzz’s back in the Van Royce.

Dinner was arranged by 6pm (apart from Graham of course...) and we were all ready to leave and not come back but we still had to stay the night coz daddy wasn’t well enough to tow the van yet....or fart with confidence. Apart from the Dingo’s hanging around the park and stealing anything they could get their paws on ....socks, shoes, plastic cups and dustpan brushes, (no babies were harmed in the writing of this blog), not much else happened.

I always believed that dingo’s were really strong looking dogs from the photos and brochures about NT but these were bug infested mangy looking mutts who looked like they should be put down yesterday..... Even the girls commented that they didn’t really resemble the Dingo’s that they were looking at in the brochures.

Shitted off (both literally and metaphorically) that this place was not worth coming to, for numerous reasons (when we had seriously considered extending our stay in Darwin for the third time), we were eager to leave and head back to civilisation. I (Lisa) woke at 4am and sat in bed til 7am waiting and wishing for the family to WAKE UP.... Once Graham woke at 7.30am a decision was made to start packing (or throwing our gear into the van with no care whatsoever). We were determined to get the hell out asap and even paid the local bakery almost $20 for some dodgy rolls and a few bottles of juice just so we didn’t have to hang around and arrange some brekkie for ourselves.

Heading off from Kak to Katherine via our friendly, dodgy burger cooking Humpty Dooians, (we had to take the long way because of our gas issue and not Grahams butt issues) we were elated to be in the car and on our way. The girls were absolutely fabulous about the entire situation and didn’t whinge during our repeated trips to and from Humpty Doo (not bad for a 5yo and 9yo). A further three hours past HD and we were finally in Katherine. So hot from sitting for hours in the car the girls frolicked in the sprinkler while Graham moved his chair and sat fully clothed under it. This was of course before we had even set up the van.

Well we would love to say that Kak was amazing, well worth the trip and beyond our expectations but all we can say is should you ever come this way and do it for yourself, please let us know coz we ain’t got no idea what it was like. Kakadu/ kakadon’t the answer is yours for the taking...we will not be coming back here any time soon even if they do decide to get gas.

Katherine was a much better option for a few days of R&R. Saturday was my birthday (Happy Bday to me) and I was woken by a beautiful brekkie in bed (pancakes and juice and gifts of homemade cards), a little retail therapy of course before lunch and then back for an arvo of swimming with a bbq for dinner. We pretty much did nothing, zilch, nada, zippo for our next few days and let Gman get himself together (was still under the weather).

Sunday started out with grandiose plans of going to Edith Falls and the Hot Springs but this idea was shortly quashed as no one wanted to lift a finger or go anywhere. Some washing was done at the laundry and off to the pool we went and stayed all day. Our park neighbours called over for a chat when we were eating our bbq and stayed til it was bedtime.

Monday was our most adventurous day at Katherine. We had booked ourselves onto the Three Gorge Cruise. This was a lovely way to spend our last day in Katherine. We were booked onto the 11am cruise and our captain was “Lauren”, yep a female. She was great, funny and very informative and her skills with the boat impressed a lot of the blokes on the tour. We had walks around the 3 gorges with Graham and the girls (being the only kids on the tour) having a swim near the rapids and in water that had freshwater crocs swimming earlier. Mum (me) waited outside on watch for the crocs but pretty much everyone from the tour was in the water (I hadn’t put my bathers on before we left and there was nowhere to change). (FYI: Freshies don’t eat humans, as their mouths are too small. Their main diet is fish, bugs, birds and snakes – learnt that at Alice, see we did remember something). Our tour finished at 3pm but it was 4.00pm before we left. Bats, bats and more bats were waiting for us when we disembarked the boat as well as a few roos. The stench from the bats was awful but luckily we were not camping there overnight like some others.

Back to the park pool for a swim and then arrangements made to go out for tea. Neither of us could be bothered to cook dinner (such a long day in the heat; it’s amazing how tired you can get from doing nothing) so we decided on Red Rooster. Yep Katherine has RR and McD’s. It’s big enough for both food groups!!!. Back to our park for showers and then bed for the girls, while Gman and I packed up the van, ready to move on in the morning.

Tuesday saw us wake slowly at 7.15am and we were on the road by 8.30am. Scarlett arranged a fashion parade after she decided on her outfit and Charlize was her quiet self sitting and reading. We have decided to spend longer in the car during the next 2 days. If we travel further we will get to our next destination sooner. So the days will probably amount to 6+ hours of travel with not much to report. Sightings of roadkill will be the scenery for a while and so far there has been so many we have lost count.
What can we say about NT for those of you thinking of coming to visit it.....well, it has a delightful beautiful and sunny blue sky interspersed with smoke and fire every day (even as I write this we are heading towards another huge fire), temperatures that are very warm both day and night, plenty of bats and bugs, not as many roos and dingos as expected, locals that require more showers than currently having, problems with Autogas as a source of fuel, too much water (who would have guessed that) and the odd whirlwind (like a mini tornado which ran across our car just moments ago). All in all we will probably head here again in the future.


Love, hugs and kisses to all and stay safe

The Travelling Van-Royces xxx

Will post some more photo's soon.

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Comments

[radka shaw]

Kakadon't
Just to let you know that our Kakadu experience was a Kakadon't, as far as John was concerned. I liked the bird life and we did get to Jim Jim Falls - except, you can only get there in the dry season so there were NO falls. John couldn't wait to get out of Kakadu. I have had takeaway from Humpty Doo. I won't say any more. Our car had duel fuel so when not on gas we had the choice of petrol - thanks heavens. Good luck with your next adventure