Category Archives: Travel

KATHERINE

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We left Mataranka and headed up the Stuart Highway to Katherine. There was washing and shopping to be done , the car was due for a service, Dianne had to catch up on some bookwork and I wanted to do some painting along the river.

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Katherine river in the dry season is lined with huge distorted paperbarks and Pandanas Palms. As you walk along the river bed evidence of the wet season floods can be seen in the tops of many of the large trees. Huge logs and branches suspended 20 to 30 feet up. All the trees slope in the direction of flow

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Walking back towards the town I found this palette 30 foot up a tree. It’s hard to imagine that much water.

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During the dry everything looks peaceful and sedate. In 6 months time all this will be under metres of fast flowing water.

Next month we will be back in Katherine with with the International Artist Workshop. We will be staying in town and visiting the gorge.

WESTERN BOWERBIRD

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These birds seem to occur all over Northern Australia. They are hyperactive, noisy little guys with elaborate bowers. The purple plume on the back of their heads rises when they want to impress another bird.

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The male builds a bower and decorates it with white and silver objects to impress the female. The female builds a nest elsewhere to lay her eggs.

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This impressive bower was decorated with white snail shells, bits of broken glass and crumpled wads of silver foil. The males are incredibly fussy about the arrangement of the decoration around their bower. If you drop in an extra snail shell, the bird will quickly pick it up and remove it.

MATARANKA

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Roper River Undergrowth

12 miles down the Roper River from Mataranka is the Elsey  National Park campground (called 12 mile yards) It’s much cleaner and quieter than the Mataranka Homestead campground. There are some excellent walks and interesting tracks to cycle along.

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Creek Crossing No.2

We discovered an old National Parks service road and decided to see where it led. Two hours and 4 creek crossings later, we emerged at Mataranka Falls.

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Mataranka Falls

Beautiful clear water, huge stands of Livingstonia Palms and a couple of freshwater crocodiles. The kind of place you don’t want to leave, especially when we had two hours of peddling to get home.

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Pandanas and Livistonia Palms

Livistonia  and Pandanas palms turn the Roper River and surrounding wetlands into a magnificent oasis. Most of the surrounding area is a dry savannah landscape.

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Paperbark Swamp Wetlands

Dry Savanna Country

Dry Savannah Country at Breakneck Speed

Once away from the river the country becomes hot and dry. Open eucalypt country with dry grass and lots of anthills – completely different to the area fringing the river.

Barb Wire Penetrating Anthill

Barb Wire Penetrating Anthill

How did they do that? Poke a fence right through an anthill.

Clear Water

Clear Water

The creeks feeding into Roper River are spring fed and have a high calcium content. This makes the water incredibly clear. It also causes calcium deposits to build up in certain areas.

We came across this little creek that had built up a hard limestone gutter over the years, making it look almost man-made.

Limestone lined Creek

Limestone lined Creek

Before we left Mataranka we decided to stay a night at the Homestead and have dinner in their restaurant. We found a reasonably isolated spot and set up camp. I went for a walk up along the river. When I came back a guy with four weird tiny little horses had camped nearby. I went and said g’day to him and he told me he was with the Moscow Circus and 40 trucks and trailers were following him! Within an hour the place was overun.

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I expected lions, tigers and elephants, but all the Moscow Circus has are four freaky little horses – I think they are to frighten children.

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The Circus was incredibly well organised They had all moved off  in small groups by 9:00 next morning – bound for Alice Springs.

MALLAPUNYAH

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MALLAPUNYA
The state of origin football final was on the night we arrived at Cape Crawford. All the stockmen from the surrounding stations were in town for a big night. We met one of the guys that run Mallapunya. He gave us directions in to an escarpment and waterfall on the property. We drove in the following day. The escarpment was spectacular but we couldn’t find the waterfall
Mallapunya Escarpment
A lot of the open country reminded me of Fred Williams paintings. The yellow grass, flowering Kapok trees and skyline saplings looked fantastic against the Ultramarine sky
Mallapunya meat

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The state of origin football final was on the night we arrived at Cape Crawford. All the stock-men from the surrounding stations were in town for a big night. We met one of the guys that run Mallapunyah. He gave us directions in to an escarpment and waterfall on the property. We drove in the following day. The escarpment was spectacular but we couldn’t find the waterfall

Mallapunyah Escarpment

Mallapunyah Escarpment

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A lot of the open country reminded me of Fred Williams paintings. The yellow grass, flowering Kapok trees and skyline saplings looked fantastic against the Ultramarine sky

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Mallapunyah meat

TEN CENT WASHERS

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Road conditions deteriorated west of Bourketown – deeper corrugations and bulldust holes hiding rocks.
We were happily bouncing along when I heard a loud bang and saw the caravan leap all over the track. I pulled over to the side to find a brand new 10ply tyre had blown.
When I put the jack under the van I could see the 3 lower spring leaves had separated from the rest and shifted around, tearing the inside wall right out of the tyre. Closer inspection showed 2 spring washers had been left off the outside u-bolt.
The springs were reset and bearings repacked by a suspension specialist just before we left. What a shame – 20 cents worth of missing spring washers just cost me a $600 wheel and tyre. It also meant we could not risk the run up to Roper Bar with just one spare. I had no nice words to say about the guy that did our suspension work!

Road conditions deteriorated west of Bourketown – deeper corrugations and bulldust holes hiding rocks.

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We were happily bouncing along when I heard a loud bang and saw the caravan leap all over the track. I pulled over to the side to find a brand new 10ply tyre had blown.

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When I put the jack under the van I could see the 3 lower spring leaves had separated from the rest and shifted around, tearing the inside wall right out of the tyre. Closer inspection showed 2 spring washers had been left off the outside u-bolt.

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The springs were reset and bearings repacked by a suspension specialist just before we left. What a shame – 20 cents worth of missing spring washers just cost us a $500 wheel and tyre. It also meant we could not risk the run up to Roper Bar with just one spare. I had no nice words to say about the guy that did our suspension work!

PUBS

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Croydon sprang up in the 1880’s. It was a gold rush town, swelling to over 7000 people and 122 pubs. The Club Hotel is the sole survivor, which gives a clue to the quality of their beer. It’s a typical Queensland pub of the era – all timber, high ceilings, wide veranda with outside seats. a great place for a beer and a meal.

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Normanton’s “Purple Pub” is built in the same wide veranda, high ceiling style, but is an unusual combination of two separately roofed buildings. I doubt it was called the purple pub when it was built in the late 1800’s –  purple wasn’t invented till way after that. It’s now the best known landmark in town.

A green butchery has sprung up since we were last there, but it doesn’t seem to be attracting near as much attention.

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This is a shot I took of the National Hotel, Mt Morgan back in the early 80’s. It was a great pub with lots of character. I went back to Mt Morgan 5 years later, intending to stay in the National, only to find it had been converted to a Methodist Church!

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Returning to Mt Morgan this trip, we drove up the hill to see what had become of the old pub.

Well, the Methodist  church had vacated and it was now a private residence. What a shame, such a great example of over the top, goldrush, hotel architecture should have drifted away from it’s intended purpose.

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Daly Waters Pub is one of the NT’s most famous. Built  on a busy droving route in the 1930’s, it was once a watering hole for thirsty cattlemen. Today it attracts tourists from all over the world. There are walls adorned with signed thongs, bras, knickers and foreign banknotes, marking the travels of thousands of visitors enjoying a rowdy beer.

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Couldn’t resist taking a photo of this colour coordinated lady taking a photo of someone drinking a pint outside the pub.

ALCOHOL AND PORNOGRAPHY

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ALCOHOL AND PORNOGRAPHY
Huge signs warn of dire consequences to anyone attempting to smuggle booze or pornography into aboriginal communities. The pub at Borroloola has all but closed down – selling only meals, no alcohol.
Hells Gate cant sell beer any more, so cant afford to stay open, removing another fuel supply from the Savannah Way. Wallagarang suffered the same fate. These new laws certainly have caused a lot of new problems trying to solve some old ones.

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Huge signs warn of dire consequences to anyone attempting to smuggle booze or pornography into aboriginal communities. The pub at Borroloola has all but closed down – selling only meals, no alcohol.

Hells Gate can’t sell beer any more, so can’t afford to stay open, removing another fuel supply from the Savannah Way. Wollagarang suffered the same fate. These new laws certainly have caused a lot of new problems trying to solve some old ones.