Travel memories: Edith Falls

Edith Falls is another place we love. The Aboriginal name is Leliyn and it you get it by turning off the Stuart Highway 42km north of Katherine then following a sealed road for 19km. It is close enough for us to do a day trip or short weekend camp.

There is large pool at the campground. Over the years floods have changed the topography of the pond as debris picked up in the wet drops over the waterfall and builds up in the shallow part in the middle. I love to swim here but its too cold for K. At night in the season the rangers give talks about the wildlife and local history.

The cane toads have had a devastating impact on the native animals and reptiles which is very sad. Humans are banned from the water after 7pm to give the locals a quiet night but if you go down after dark with torch the eyes of the various animals, reptiles and fish can be spotted reflected in its beam. K can spend hours doing just that at night.

 Like every where spectacular, and I think K picks these places because of my fear of heights,  there's a climb up  to and down from another set of most beautiful swimming holes. But look at the view.

Great place to spend a hot day.


 Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move.

NT Fireworks

 

I was just watching the Sunsuper Riverfire  fireworks display from Brisbane. Very impressive .

I felt compelled to compete in some way by showing you the fireworks at Mataranka Homestead on Territory Day.

Here in the NT on July 1st you can buy fireworks in the morning from 9 am. They have to be used up that day, although for a few weeks after it is not unusual to hear bangs late at night.

We have a family night in town and then out here later all the tourists get to set off their purchases.

Reminds me of my childhood.


Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move

Essential Tasks. Or where is Mr Fix It

K is on the road to Newcastle so I'm home in the caravan by myself. At moments like this I am acutely aware of the various tasks that have to be done around our little house. 




Our nearest neighbours, entertaining the peahens this morning

We are currently hooked up to 240v electricity and the local water supply so we are not relying on the solar panels and we are not carrying water in from somewhere else and filling the tanks, which we have to do when free-siting.  However our power and water systems need ongoing care. When K is here that is his area of expertise.

Batteries need exercise. They are being charged by our power management system all the time, so to exercise them we are running one of the fridge freezers off battery and there is a power board we use to charge phones and the like plugged into the inverter. K lifts the lid of the power area and checks the batteries every now and again. Ok a bit more than now and again. Frequently.

Not a bad view from the cab of the car this morning

The water supply here is has a noticeable concentration of lime although it is potable. When you heat the water the lime drops out and deposits in the kettle and water heater. It also settles out onto taps and makes the bathroom  and shower surfaces look like you never cleaned them. Coming from Adelaide which has high calcium levels in the water we are pretty familiar with this.

However the lime drops to the bottom of the heater tanks and  if it  builds up high enough the thermostat in the hot water heater is no longer in contact with water and therefore does not turn off.  Busted element.  Burnt out. Big repair job. Mr Fix It has a couple of water heaters around that he cleans up and swaps with sick ones for the accommodation blocks.

Not wanting our little heater to get this sick,  or our  kettle to have a white crust on the bottom, once a week K boils vinegar in the kettle and once every three months adds it to the hot water service. He de-limes the shower head and taps, and he treats the shower surfaces to remove the build  up. (He does this for 15 cabins and over 20 motels rooms on a regular maintenance cycle)

The water here is ok to drink (It has to be tested each year to keep the Bistro food licence)  but not to put through the coffee machine so K refills the bladders of the 10 litre water boxes you can buy at the supermarket from a neighbour's rainwater tank. Boxed and bottled water is more expensive than just about any other thing here. The mark up is astounding.

Another major task K does is the toilet cassette. Since we treat it with napisan the odour is ok and I can manage the actual emptying, I do find getting it out of its box and into the ute tray a bit hard. Not a pleasant task, but not awful enough to make me go out on the ablutions block expedition at night.

Some travellers fly in. This is a common
 sight up behind our camp site

All of these important tasks have become mine for a couple of weeks.
As well as filling the windscreen washer in the ute, a thing K usually dors cos I have trouble getting my hand in past the roo bar to work the latch. Oh and refilling the diesel jerry can  I used out bush yesterday.  And switching over the gas bottle to the spare one and taking it down to be filled ....... And unscrewing the impeller in the washing machine to get the coins out that were rattling around during last weeks wash.


I do miss him you know. (Not just because of the extra work either)

 Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move

Trash or treasure: Or upgrade my computer

View through the door

Living in a small place with someone who is horrified by what people throw away has its moments. We start any long stay at a camp site with a beautifully set up out door space. Cooking, fridges and camp chairs sit neatly under the annex. It looks pretty good.

Then the inevitable occurs. Someone gives him an old thingy.
"I can't get this to work. Thought you might like to have a go at it." This comment actually translates as, "I have no idea how to get rid of this thingy that I have broken. You dump it for me please."

Said thingy gets tried out, and put in the to be looked  pile.

People give K  appliances or tents or chairs, or computers or BBQs or   ...... you get the picture....  and guess where they end up?  On the pile, to the sound of, "How lovely that you found that dear. Who are you giving that to?" 


Rescued stove.

K is very talented at turning trash into working and useful items. And he does get rid of the left over parts to the dump with some regularity. Although a trip to the dump can sometimes yield other projects. (And car parts as well. Cheaper than the wrecker's yard)

I admit to sometimes finding K's hobby as irritating as he finds my ability to disappear into a book for hours. But not last weekend.  My new tablet PC is now sporting an extra hard drive in the keyboard docking station and a SD card in the tablet. Both very useful. Both salvaged from notebooks that were no longer working. Both at no $ cost to us.

 

I got a more file storage, K got the fun of fixing and recycling AND most importantly the extra bits went to the dump.

Except that he was given an Android tablet by a staff member on Saturday. They lost the charger.

Like I said. There are moments when.....


Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move

The Battle of the Cutting Board

Bench top real estate is at a premium in our caravan where two large steps get you from the door to the fridge. The tiny bit of bench next to the door houses the coffee machine, a green tub for pods and the mugs we use all the time. The next bit is the stove top which has a glass lid with a black place mat on top protect  the glass. The black mat is great place on which to put things when I want to photograph them for you all to see.



Our caravan kitchen space.

Then there is a very small stainless steel draining board and sink. We then reach the corner where my spice rack hangs and the portable dish drainer has its home.  Effectively the only work space is the draining board and the plastic cutting board that fits over the sink.  The board is shaped to match the sink and has cute little cut-outs on the side that are meant to let you get your hands in to lift it and allow water from the draining board and dish drainer to flow uninhibited  down the drain.


And there in lies the source of the battle. 

I like the cutting board in its little home all the time. K likes to be able to thrust his hands under the tap to wash them without having to lift the board out or climbing past the bed to the bathroom sink at the other end of the van.

I want to be able to work on the thing without having to search for it. Besides it covers the dishes that live in the sink until I wash them. We have to save water you know!

K gets cross when water runs back behind the sink towards the window when I try to sneak a glass under the tap without lifting the cutting board.  Or forget to place the dish drainer so the edge matches the hole in the cutting board thus accidentally directing water onto the bench instead of down the drain.  And so it goes.

This has been an ancient battle - or at least an ongoing skirmish - for as long as we have had our little home.

The battle is now over.

Peace was achieved by the creation of a hole.

This wondrous invention lies directly under the tap, allowing water to flow into the sink, hands and glasses alike having free access to water without the cutting board doing a disappearing act. All Mr Fix It has to do was to visit the shed in the back of the ute and extract a hole saw and battery drill, measure carefully and make a lot of noise. Who'd have thunk it?



Handy drain hole cut with a hole saw lets water drain.
 (Yellow stain are from fruit. Time to bleach it again)
 

Now If I could just remember to turn off the lights and put the sink plug in the same place every time we could have everlasting harmony in our tiny space.


Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move.

 

Boosting the power on the move. Or Mr Fix It strikes again

Having enough stored battery power at the end of a day's travel is pretty important to us. We like to have water pumped by the 12v pump, to see by the 12v lights, maybe watch the 12v TV or make coffee. (Ok coffee is the most important, but you get my drift) This is only possible if the batteries have got enough juice to run things.


We have camp in one place power well under control. We have ample capacity for solar power generation; two 200 watt panels in a carry case on the back of the van, one 40 watt on the roof and another 80 watts packed away for long stays. And we can always give in and run the generator.

.

Solar panels and wind generator

We also have a small wind generator for windy days and nights. This is brilliant at the beach, but not so reliable in hilly places where the wind swirls.

Whilst travelling, the car's electrical system has to charge the cranking battery and the second car battery which will have the two camping fridge freezers plugged in, as well as run whatever is on in the car AND charge the caravan batteries.

So K has decided to help the poor car out by connecting the roof mounted solar panel, and by mounting this device on the wind generator pole while we travel. If we did this with our normal wind generator it would blow apart as it is not designed for car type speeds.

 He has connected a whirly gig extractor fan, the kind you see on the top of dog trailers to remove heat, to a car alternator which will go round and round driven by the fan as we motor along. Since the alternator is designed to go round really fast driven by the speed of the car motor, I  am assured that it will work just as if the car was running it. It will all be managed by our charging system which was seriously upgraded this summer.

 

There is a lot more maths and science to this than I can hope to understand, as well as lots of research into safety and such.

The contraption is ready for a road test attached to the car and an isolated battery this weekend on the airstrip. Be interesting to see how well it goes.

If you interested in customised 12 volt set ups try this article. It appears that the need to tweak things in a caravan is a common affliction.

Cheers Sue

A Ferg  the Move

Peacocks and other hungry animals

I had hungry visitors this morning at breakfast time. Its hot. 35 degrees at least during the days now, although still 20ish at night. The tourists are just about all gone to cooler climates. In fact this next week will see us beginning to close down parts of the park for off season maintenance.

Anyway the relevance of the lack of tourists is that they feed the wildlife. Some of them buy food for the wallabies and as a result the local population congregate here for the dry. And I suspect breed up as a result of the abundance. The local birds feast on scraps and the feral pigs haunt the tip.

Peacock and his haram foraging

I'm as guilty as the next person of tossing scraps for the pet wallabies that have been rescued and raised here. In fact I have been known to have to leap out of the door to recover my veggie scraps after absentmindedly chucking them out when we are not in fact parked at Mataranka. I must look a sight scrabbling in the dirt with a plastic bag in my hand.

Wallaby checking us out

However the impact of the sudden loss of food sources was driven home to me when I had to almost shove aside five peahens and a peacock this morning to get to my outdoor kitchen to boil the kettle. They were not impressed that there was no food in my hands and honked rudely at me.

Excuse me. I need to get to kettle.

I wonder even more as I am woken at night by hungry wallabies tearing at and eating ...yes eating....the cardboard boxes stacked outside the door ready for the rubbish truck. As the year goes on this will become more common. The birds, peafowl, and 'roos forage through everything looking for food to keep them alive until the wet comes. Sometimes the annex looks like the floor of a teenager's bedroom.

Just visiting. What's for breakfast. 

Yet .........   I can't bring myself to bin my scraps when K's favourite baby, the one that appears every year to get a scratch the moment we park the caravan, turns up to share my pear core and banana peal. At least I get a good breakfast each morning.

Coffee, fruit and nuts. My breakfast of choice

A moral dilemma indeed


Cheers Sue






A Ferg on the Move

Skydiving and caravan reading

Holiday activity for dad and youngest son

My new tablet computer arrived today so I have been transferring settings and files. In the process
I found this collage I created of K skydiving in Brisbane a couple of summers ago.  Madness.....

I have posted it mostly because I like the effect of the collage, but it does prove that  while we might have joined the grey army one of us at least is still young at heart.

Setting up the computer took up most of the evening.
However I did get to look at the latest Caravan World Magazine online and here are two articles from there that I found useful.


DC to Dc battery charging



10 Safe caravanning tips


Cheers Sue
A Ferg on the Move

First Aid, Plastic cling wrap and more lamb

I spent the weekend updating my First Aid qualification, a useful but very tiring activity that used up most of Saturday and Sunday.  Again I am struck with how far people have to travel to things out here.  I did 118km, but was outdone by one participant who travelled 269 km.

 

There are always a few things that grab your funny bone when we all get to together to be tied up in various ways. Apparently I was not at all subtle about my feelings when it was my turn to be the accident victim. I  thought  I was very obliging when Geoff our instructor insisted that I had broken my elbow. ..... Oh well you be the judges.

The list of things that we need to carry in our cars in addition to a very good First Aid kit grew as the days went on. A towel for padding the "bumpy bits" of female accident victims when immobilising and arm against the body, as well as padding knobbly knees and ankles when using the good leg as a splint for a broken one...leg that is. Alfoil to lay over the stomach if intestines are exposed.... A few of us felt sick at that one. And my favourite,  a roll of plastic cling wrap. This is for sealing a sucking chest wound, wrapping a knocked out tooth and sealing away a severed finger should you find one.

Our trainer was truly entertaining, as you can see.

So about the lamb.  Moroccan  Lamb pizza with artfully drizzled yoghurt. See I am finding things on which to use yukky yoghurt.  The other lamb delight for this week so far was K's roast shoulder (of lamb)   cooked in our glass oven and ready to eat as I pulled into the caravan park after a delightful (and I'm not being sarcastic) day of teaching.

Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move

Animal Stars

This post is dedicated to the animals we have encountered along the way. Memories of places are attached to the animals we saw there.


Giant clam and turtle at Cape Laveque in far north Western Australia.

 

 

Horse and foal on the Roper Highway in Northern Territory. These horses are descendants of those used on Elsey Station. We see these regularly on the way to Jilkmiggan.

Black tailed wallabies on the islands in Lake Argyle, near Kununurra in the Kimberly region of Western Australia.

Johnson Crocodile, also known as a fresh water crocodile at Geikie Gorge National Parl.

Peacock visiting K for breakfast in Darwin. These birds are in just about every caravan park we visit. Not native to Australia however. They roost high up in the gum trees at night away from feral cats and dogs. The delightful honk works like an alarm clock in the morning.

 

 

Baby Cherrapin, a large thin claw prawn in a creek near Derby Western Australia.

 



Geese at Sandfire Western Australia. This place has been burnt down several times. A testament to the tenacity of outback dwellers.

 

 

 

 And my absolute favourite has to be the magnificent sight of a pod of female whales and their young at the head of the Great Australian Bight in South Australia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm sure there are even more in the archives.

 

 

 

Cheers Sue

 

A Ferg on the Move.

Frugal Friday: Barramundi, Tunisian Lamb and a Legless Lizard

I didn't work today. I have a First Aid course all weekend so Friday became Saturday for me.

So washing in the twin tub, this week's yoghurt, butter spread and gluten free bread.

The cook, the one who cooks the best steak on the Stuart Highway, hitched a ride with a helicopter to one of the islands out past Port Roper on his days off and came back with a couple of beauties. A few herbs and some salad and a white wine of course. Great lunch.

Jay's saltwater barra.

I am experimenting with using our home made yoghurt in various ways. Today's experiment was to see what I could do with the tougher cuts of the  farm grown lamb we still had in the freezer. Usually I crock pot these, cool and pull of the meat to make pies or shepherd's pie. Today I  deboned the meat  to make small steaks and mixed yoghurt and my home made, salt free Tunusian Spice Mix and left them in the fridge for a couple of hours. Couple of minutes on the grill, salad and WOW!

Tunisian spiced yoghurt lamb steaks and salad

Our excitement for the day was a visit from a legless lizard. Google tells me that snakes have forked tongues while legless lizards have fleshy tongues, ears you can see and pointy heads. They are like geckos without legs and not usually seen in the day time. This one didn't read his page on Google did he?

 

Legless Lizard

Add caption

 Now I need to get ready for the First Aid course. I hope the instructor is up to it. Teachers make the worst students and I am no exception.

Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move

 

Travel Memories: Litchfield National Park NT

 

 

 

 

Florence Falls, Litchfield National Park NT

Time for another trip down memory lane.

 

 

Litchfield National Park is another one of our "best places" to visit  in the Northern Territory.
It is near the town of Batchelor 100km south of Darwin so it is the perfect place to pop into if we are going up to the airport, or when these photos were taken, towing the caravan on holiday. We set up at Batchelor Caravan Park on the grass,  a luxury in the dry season, put out the solar panels and saved ourselves a few dollars each night on peak time powered site fees. Stayed a couple of days and drove in to the park each day. There are lots of places to go in the park but we love these two the best.

Florence Falls is spectacular, although each time I have to brace myself for the very long set of steps down and the even longer is seems steps up. I reckon someone has it in for me. All the good places require me to climb steps. Up is bad enough, but down does not very nice things to my brain.

Florence Falls, double waterfalls, great swim

We love Buley Rockhole where we sat in the various pools and let the water flow over and past us.




We grabbed lunch at the Batchelor Buttefly Farm and Tea House. Great Food and a walk through butterfly aviary. There was even be a turtle in the one of the ponds.



Good memories

Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move.

Things are slowing down here. Or steak, whips and supermarket checkouts.

We had dinner at the Bistro tonight. Our chef, a young Australian lad, is here for his third season. He works the peak tourist time and then does the backpacker thing in our summer in Asia and Europe. Sort of the young person's version of our life. K is working on his car for him at the moment.
Anyway he cooks the best steak on the Stuart Highway, in my opinion. I had to have one tonight cos he is off and away next week.

Gary Booth, guitar, didge, mouth organ and vocals

Model Barramundi created one weekend with local
and travelling children.

The entertainment here is winding down now. No more band, but we do have the whip cracking show for a few more weeks. Nathan Grigg's show is spectacular. He is the Guinness World Record holder for the number of whip cracks in a minute, 530 in fact. His is a consummate showman, and a genuine nice kid (well he is younger than our youngest son) If you ever get the chance to see his show take it.

Check out his website and this video.

This is our favourite time of the year. The place becomes quieter. We can find a space in the Thermal pool and it is still cool in the late evening until mid morning.

Favourite path to Stevie's Hole, Elsie National Park.

Another bonus that the tourist wind down gives us is access to a checkout queue at Woolworths in Katherine. In peak season shopping is an all day job, not counting the 109 km drive too and from. Picture  the checkout area of your local supermarket with 100 trolleys and their attendant couples and families waiting to be served after navigating around each other in the isles.

"You exaggerate," you say. Well actually I don't.
One fine Saturday last season I drove up with a lovely lady from school and several lists from staff and friends to shop. An hour later with two trolleys between us we hit the queue. An hour and a half later having exhausted all possible topics of conversation I left my trolley with my companion and dodged and weaved down the rows counting trolleys. 102!!!! (There's a Facebook post I did that day that has the photo I took of each end of the checkout area.)

So while I am grateful for the tourists, cos K makes his money off them, at least when they leave I can do a monthly shop in a bit less than three hours.



Bush camp south of Broome
  

 

Sometime soon it will be time for us to shed our worker skins, become tourists ourselves and set the caravan free to be its truly mobile self.


Cheers Sue

A Ferg on the Move