Adelaide River,Litchfield

G'day Mates,

On the road again!!

From Katherine our way was going back towards Darwin with the first stop in Adelaide River, a small town with some WWII history. The biggest attraction was Bundy Station were we stayed 2 nights and it was just lovely.

Wildlife and farm animals everywhere and the "kids" even saw a snake, and there was a swimming pool! How great can it be, cooling off in the pool, overlooking the farm!

We had a nice shady spot under the big trees....

Look at this tree, like Tarzan you could hang on the roots!

Boots walking to heaven

 Never knew geese could sit in a tree haha!

Gee, did we had a good time here!......

We did a little tour and ended up at the war cemetery which was very well maintained.

And when we came back, Fred had a little job to do, making a new 12 volt plug for a light, with the assistance of Danny....

After leaving Bundy Station, we drove to Litchfield National Park and stayed at Wangi Falls. At the beginning of the park we stopped at the Magnetic Termite Mounds

Fred and I were here in Litchfield just 2 years ago so when you want to see some more pictures or want some more information I maybe forgot this time, you can always go back to the story of 02-11-2013.

Anyhow, as well as in Kakadu we had showers and toilets on the camp ground, these are not really free camps as you pay a fee for it but that doesn't matter as these facilities are of course great and has to be cleaned. Wangi falls was just $ 6,60 per person and it's an honesty box. So please people, when you go to these parks be honest and pay otherwise these  accommodations will disappear one day.

The first night we had in mind to make a shashlik from chicken and some salad. We already thought something didn't smell very well but at first we thought it was the water coming out of the tank. At the time Fred had finished cutting the chicken into cubes we noticed it was the chicken. An hour work in a stinking hot caravan, no power so no aircon, all for nothing.

We checked the rest of the chicken, as we bought a lot in Katherine and it was all vacuum packed and not even near end of use date, but it was all rotten, we had to chuck 2 kilo chicken away. But there we had a problem; there are no bins in the park and there were signs to take your rubbish with you. We are staying another two nights so what do we do with 2 kilo rotten chicken?? You can't leave it out side and can't leave it in our bin in the caravan. Several suggestions passed and at the end we decided to leave it somewhere in the bush, of course without plastic package and nature will do the rest.

Anyhow what do we eat now?  Luckily we had bought salmon for my birthdays planned champagne breakfast which will be in two days so I took that to make a salad and it tasted well.

Next morning the "kids" went for an early walk and saw a snake again near the falls on a platform.
From Wangi we made a tour, first to Tolmer Falls where we walked a loop from about 2 k's;

After Tolmer we went to Florence Falls

and Buley Rockholes. It was very hot and busy as it was in a weekend and it actually wasn't much fun at the falls but at the Buley Rockholes we had a great time, we had lunch and beer with us so didn't had something short.

We had planned to stay in Wangi falls with my birthday but because of the meat we had to throw away and the heat, we decided to leave Sunday morning 18th October and go back to Darwin, to our previous caravan park. There we can have champagne brunch in stead of brekkie.
Because we didn't want to throw more meat away if we kept it too long, we ate on my birthday what we still had in stead of going out for dinner which was the original plan.

On Monday the 19th the boys had a father and son day and I cleaned the caravan inside, Patricia started packing a bit. On Tuesday we went to the big shopping centre in Casuarine where Fred and I bought new supplies for our trip to Queensland.  At night we had a lovely meal in Palmerston at the Palmerston Sports Club...very nice;

On Wednesday we had our last picnic together of course with bubbles,

Afterwards we cooled off in the swimming pool and the home goers had to pack their suit cases. Their flight was Thursday morning 10 minutes to nine so they had to be there at least seven o'clock so it was an early getting up.

Of course saying goodbye is always emotional so the tissues did their jobs. When they disappeared from our sight we drove off towards our empty accommodation but on our way back we also had to buy a new gas bottle as ours was empty.

We took off the same day as we had to be at the mechanics in Katherine early next morning. We went to the same caravan park we had been before the kids came, north bank caravan park, and the woman owner gave me a big hug as she recognised me. They are lovely people and although there are a lot permanents and the place looks like a museum, it is a very nice and relaxed place to be.

The "kids" are save back home and we are getting the hell out of here; so next;

Queensland HERE WE COME: (hope it cooler there)

Cheers!

Litchfield National Park

G'day Mates!

From Darwin we went down to Litchfield National Park.

Just after the entrance our first stop was at the Magnetic Termite Mounds. You already have seen through my blogs that there are a lot different termite/ant houses, this is a field  with mounds that stand up to two metres with the thin edges pointing north-south, minimising their exposure to the sun.

Isn't it amazing these small animals can build this!

This is the impressive cathedral termite mound up to 6 metres tall.

After this we arrived at Wangi Falls, here you can camp without power but showers and toilets were there. You take a form out of a box, on the form which you fill out, is a little bag in which you put the requested money and this bag you put in a box at the entrance of the park. Its all about honesty!

With our extra folding solar panel we hope we can stay a bit longer....

our view...

There was a great waterhole in which you can swim, have a nice story about that later!

The Wangi Falls;

Watch the movie...

At night, we were peacefully sitting outside, when suddenly I heard a lot of noise coming out of the bush and at seemed like something big was running our way, and then we saw a huge wild pig passing us at about just 2 meters in front of us, brrrrr, he was to quick to make a picture.....

This was a very special bird, they have entertained us the days we were there. This one I know haha, it is the Great Bower bird, the sexes are similar but the male has a lilac nape crest which forms a rosette in display. The male tries to seduce the female by gathering special things........

In the film its hard to see the rosette but on the picture you can see it quite well...

here you can see what he has collected, he lays it under a tree and they come back to this tree all the time, it looks like they dance around the tree and she is looking what he has gathered..... 

he shows her what he has found and then he often shows her the back of his head on which the rosette appears.......

Sometimes suddenly another male comes between them and then he starts to show the lady what is under the tree but that's not fair, he didn't collect it!

We have been watching this for three days and the poor fella kept seducing and we will never know if he succeeded...

In the mean time the bird also was very busy to protect his treasures.....

At last the little Wallaby left, getting enough of the hissing of the bird.....

We wanted to stay another day in Wangi Falls to go to Florence Falls which was approx. 25 k's back down the road when our neighbour said he was going to the Florence Falls with the caravan. Because I didn't knew you could camp there too we never thought about going there with the caravan so we also packed our things and took off to Florence Falls. When we came at that camp the sign on the road said that caravans weren't allowed so we were very angry and didn't know what to do. Fortunately my bible said opposite, so we turned and tried our luck by driving into that dirt road. It was just 1 kilometre and we got into a campground again, it was much smaller then at Wangi Falls but very nice!

When we had settled we first went to Buley Rockhole;

very nice for cooling off a bit.......

I can tell you a scary story now;

After the cooling off in Buley Rockhole we went back to the caravan, had a nice drink and a meal and after that I was doing the dishes at the parks sink. There was a guy next to me also doing his dishes and we started to talk. He asked me if we had been to Wangi Falls already and so I said we left there that morning. Well he told me they had been there that afternoon and everybody was urged to come out of the water because there was a croc spotted, although he was spotted 2 k's from the swimming hole, its very scary still!!

They had closed Wangi Falls for 3 days!! Weren't we lucky!

Florence Falls from above;

Florence Falls from the swimming hole

Of course I wanted to swim there to

After the cool dive, we did a small walk which was very nice! This is all to be reached by foot from the camping ground.....

We had a marvellous time in Litchfield National Park!!

Till soon (I hope).