Edith Falls; a swim paradise

G'day Mates,

Last story I ended with "free" camp Mardugal but I'm not ready there yet because we also did a nice walk there along the river but I thought maybe the story will be too long so I'll start with it now.

Through the other part of Mardugal, which was closed for the season, we walked to the ramp at the river....

This was at the ramp but we could walk on along the river via a track....

This tree branch look like a monkey

No crocs spotted yet.....

Just nice.....

After this adventure we headed off to Pine Creek. Actually the first plan as to go straight to Edith Falls but we needed power again at least for one night to load everything up and to get the fridges cool again so we decided to go to that nice Railway resort we already had been checking out a few weeks before.

 Aah did we had a good time there in the pool 

and a nice meal at the Lazy Lizard Restaurant.

Next day we went to Edith Falls, what a great place. The only thing that scared us off a bit was that someone told us there were tiny fish in the water that nibble on you, especially when you have wounds. But heroes as we are, we went into the water and yes, of course it's Danny again they wanted to eat. I noticed, when you keep moving they don't come near you.

At one stage a ranger came and yelled and whistled to some blokes who we climbing on the rocks near the falls and urged them to come off the rocks. There are signs everywhere not to climb on them but there are always idiots who don't listen/read.  It took a while before they came back and they were asked to leave the park immediately and so they packed all the picnic stuff they had with them and the whole group of approx. 10 people had to go because of 3 stupid guys.

The camp around Edith Falls is great, $ 10.00 per person except for pensioners, they pay $ 9.00 haha, a whole dollar discount, isn't that amazing.

Brekkie being served....

It wouldn't be us if we didn't do a walk....

We did the walk to the upper pools and it was amazing;

Some parts were pretty steep....

Wildlife everywhere 

But all the climbing and effort was worth it.... 

Luckily we had enough water and lemon squash so I could make my "Tammy sapje" as we called it, and of course we also had our lunch taken with us.

Movie time: 

Totally exhausted but satisfied we hang in our chaires and were glad it was BEER-O'CLOCK.....

It wasn't in my plan to go to Katherine but we needed supplies and we have to get that window fixed as it is bloody hot inside so after Edith Falls we went to Katherine. 

First the kids did some washing,

 then we did the shopping and after that Fred and I went to the garage where we had the car fixed the first time in Katherine because they also have a wreckers yard and most probably could supply the parts for the window.

We made the appointment for Friday the 23 rd October, directly after the kids would have gone back to Holland.

In the mean time they would check if they had a second hand window motor.

When we returned to the caravan park, which is the one next to the hot springs, Danny and Patricia went to the hot springs (see the movie 3 stories back). We prepared dinner.

Next morning Danny and Fred went to the springs and came back with wild stories about naked women being there with a dog. Well, they were very excited so it must have been true, we'll never know.........

to be continued so, see you soon,

Cheers!

Kakadu, here we come!!

G'day Mates, lets continue our "holiday" story.....


On our way to Kakadu we started with a stop at Bark Hut Inn but before that we booked a Crocodile Jumping tour for our two guests. Maybe I can ask for some pictures from one of them to show you. And there we had a disaster again. The road to the tour had 4 k's dirt road and though the woman had told me the road was good, it was corrugated again, the result I will tell you later.

poor us leaving behind......

Anyhow the tour was a success and even we had seen some crocodiles while we were standing on the shore.

Next two pictures Patricia sent me;

Scary  isn't he.......

But I think the most frightened part was as they told us, that the captain had lost a bit concentration or was too much involved telling stories about the crocs, that he cruised the boat towards the shore, right into the scrub with spider webs and they were terrified because they were sitting in the front haha!!

The Bark Hut Inn was nice and most of us had a buffalo burger which was nice tucker! But when we came we had a laugh again. I got a voucher on which you could get a free drink when you booked a powered site in their caravan park so of course we went to the bar to collect, I got 3 beer and 1 white wine and I walked away with the drinks but the girl called me back, I still had to pay $ 19.00 because there was only 1 free drink haha.

Next day we drove into Kakadu and ended up at Ubirr, the Aboriginal art site and Sunset lookout. The camp close by, called Merl had toilets and showers but no power and costed $ 10.00 p.p.

There we discovered that unfortunately we had trouble with the car again. First the window on drivers side, which was just repaired in Broome, didn't come up again like the first time.  Secondly, when we came back from checking were we had to go the next day for a free guided aboriginal art tour, Fred saw something leaking again under the car. When he checked we saw that one of the batteries (luckily we have two) had been sliding, most probably caused by the road to the tour, and it had hit one of the belts.
Of course these belts get hot while driving and it had melted through the battery so the liquid dripped over parts of the engine. What a disaster! In the first place I was nearly in panic, thought the whole holiday of the kids would end there in the bush.

Danny is covering the window

But Fred wouldn't be Fred when he didn't fixed it. As the battery consist of compartments, he let out the rest of the liquid and closed the gap with silicon kit and threw a bucket with water over the parts where the liquid had dripped as that stuff is nasty, it eats through things.

Danny and Patricia wanted to go for a walk, Danny covered in a towel against the heat and the sun 

and they had just left when we got an extra visitor;

He had seen a chip laying around...

Sunday October the 4 th we did the tour with the aboriginal guide. He told nice stories but I couldn't understand every thing.

He also told a lot about their habits.....

I made pictures and actually, when we were in an aboriginal cultural centre a few days later, I read that they don't like you to take pictures of them and in any case you should ask. I'm sorry I didn't so I apologise. But  I think a guide like him will be used to it now as I certainly wouldn't be the only one.
The walk was very interesting and we saw a lot Aboriginal paintings, they all tell stories.....

When the tour was finished we walked back to the car park via another track and we passed some more Aboriginal art.

When we came back at the camp we had a nice easy day though it was warm and Danny decided to go for a walk on his own and came back with this picture;

All crocs!

This was just a few k's from our camp, its the Cahills crossing over the East Alligator River and there was a lookout.

Look at these guys, just fishing meters away from the crocs and when you now how fast these big animals can be and how they can jump!! Terrifying !!

The next day we decided to go to the sunset on top of the rocks but before that we went to that crossing first to see these crocs with our own eyes, unfortunately there weren't many then, just a stray one....

If you ever go to Kakadu, don't forget to go to this sunset, it's just beautiful and though it is a bit of a climb and at some stages even scary if you are scared of highs, it is really worth the effort;

Isn't he a gentleman

Its getting nicer and nicer......

I hope you enjoyed that!

From Merl we went to Jabiro and had a very nice caravan park with a great pool.

If you look good you can see our car and caravan between the bushes

The first day we had the window fixed again, actually not really fixed because the motor is broken but they put the window up and it can't come down anymore. We thought that wouldn't be a problem but when we came back on the caravan park we already faced a difficulty, Fred had to type a code into a box to open the gate aha, the first problem!

Next day we wanted to go to Nourlangi rocks and when we came to the turn off there was a sign that the road was closed due to bush fires. We did smell smoke but didn't know it was there.

From Jabiru we went to a power free spot again near Cooinda, called Mardugal Campground. At first we thought it was closed as there was a sign that it was closed so we decided to go to the caravan park Cooinda and also to book for the yellow river cruise for the visitors.

During my booking for the caravan park I found out that the other park indeed was open so we discussed it together and decided to go there. That was a good choice as it was lovely, still very hot but there were some big water tanks overflowing and the kids liked cooling off under it.

Next day they did the early morning tour and liked it very much, of course also here I will ask for some pictures. We did the same tour years ago and also were very impressed.

Patricia's pictures;

I hope you enjoyed this story again and of course we aren't finished yet, there is lots more to come so.......see ya soon!

Cheers!