Hello Western Australia!!!

When we started this trip we weren’t sure whether we’d visit Western Australia.  We don’t want to just rush around the country, we want to be able to stop and stay somewhere when we want to.  So we’d thought maybe we would just do up the east coast and down the middle, saving WA for a future trip.  But as we came around the top we began to realise our journey would feel incomplete if we didn’t do WA.  So here we are in Western Australia!

I didn’t realise it until SkeeterBug (10) pointed it out to me, but now the kids have been in every state and major territory in Australia.  JitterBug (8) argued that we didn’t go far enough into South Australia last December so it shouldn’t count.  He was overruled.  :) A year ago my kids had never been anywhere in Australia besides Victoria.  Wait, can I say that again?

A year ago my kids had never left Victoria.

WA has strict quarantine rules.  The big one is no fresh fruit or vegies.  There’s a rest area just next to the quarantine check where we stopped to make sure we’d eaten or disposed of everything.  All the fruit stickers on this sign made me laugh, everyone eats that last piece of fruit here.  In the top picture above you can see the quarantine station in the background.  They asked us what we had and even got in the caravan and poked around in the cupboards.  We’d been through a similar process when we went to Tasmania, but this one was the most invasive thorough of any of the other states we’ve visited.  Thankfully we’d heard about it but I’m sure it takes some travellers by surprise.

There we are, right on the border!  It will be some time before we see another state border.

You don’t need to look at a map of Australia for very long before you realise that WA is huge.  Massively huge.  We’re planning to spend a few months making our way down the coast and around the bend, meaning we’ll be in WA for Christmas!  We’re looking forward to all the beautiful sunsets, beaches, snorkelling, gorges, national parks…the list is endless.  We’re at the end of the tourist season so we don’t have to deal with all the crowds, we just have to put up with the heat.  So lovely to be in Western Australia!

Overnight in Timber Creek: Croc Feeding!

Another of those whirly winds we often see as we are driving.  They come and go quickly, often whirling themselves out of existence in seconds.

As we moved west we started seeing a more varied landscape.  Goodbye flat outback, hello mountain ranges!  We have seen so much scenery that reminds us of southern Utah or Arizona.

Our last night in the Northern Territory was spent in Timber Creek.  We wanted a place with a pool so we could have a swim but this caravan park also has a croc & kite feeding every evening.  What a fabulous way to draw in travellers!  The creek at the back of the property (I’m assuming the creek was Timber Creek) was home to a dozen or so freshwater crocodiles.  We got to watch while an employee of the park fed the crocodiles from a bridge, even getting them to jump a bit.

It was very nerve-wracking being on this bridge with a toddler.  The railings were too far apart, nothing to stop a small child from falling in.  And of course he was not willing to be held the whole time so we had to kneel down with him and have an arm around him or hang onto his shorts.  [What’s really scary is that we snuck away from the kids that night and came down to the creek with a torch to look for glowing crocodile eyes…well, we thought we’d snuck away but he came after us and caught up with us on that bridge.  In the dark.  Yikes!]

I’ve looked back through my pictures and really don’t have any good ones of them jumping.  She held the meat out on a hook dangling from a pole.  I was wondering how the crocs don’t hurt themselves on the hook but it had just enough give on it that they could get the meat off without injuring themselves.

Quit growing up, kid.  His hair is a mess because it’s way too long he’d been in the pool.

There were a couple of bigger ones, most were small.  She said not all of them showed up every day at feeding time.  She only gave them small bits of food, not enough to keep them from looking for food on their own.

Where’s the crocodile?  There.  There’s the crocodile!.  (What you can’t see in this picture is Dad’s hand holding onto the back of his shorts!)

I think it’s so interesting to see how they float in the water.  I just don’t picture crocodiles as swimming creatures.  I picture them crawling up the river bank after some food!

Next it was time for the kite feeding.  She led us away from the bridge and suddenly there were ten or so kites circling overhead!  They knew it was feeding time.

A couple of them kept landing directly above me.  None stayed there long, too much chance for food to keep still!  When we visited the Billabong Sanctuary in Townsville they fed a kite during their free flight bird show, throwing the food up for the kite to snatch out of the air.  I remember him saying that in the wild a kite has to fight for its food as there are always other kites around going for the same thing.  We often see them as we are driving, groups of them circling around.

I know this is an exciting picture, but it’s the only one I took of the kids feeding the kites.  The woman had little chunks of meat and after she’d thrown a few she invited everyone to have a go.  It was great fun watching the kites swoop in and grab the meat out of the air.  Occasionally they’d miss due to our inept throwing and if it landed far enough away they’d grab it off the ground.  (That strategically placed black rectangle is to hide how much someone’s swimsuit was riding up.)  :)

TurboBug had a go, and it was the cutest thing.  He had to try several times to even get the meat to land far enough away that a bird would come get it.

He was so, so satisfied with himself when one of the birds dropped down out of the sky in front of him to eat the piece of meat he’d thrown.  The look on his face here (and those gumboots!) makes me laugh every time I see it.

In the trees along the creek was a huge bat colony.  A noisy one.  Did you know bats are noisy?  They remind me of angry budgies clacking away at each other.  There were heaps and heaps of them.  We could hear them from our campsite, after they’d left for the evening it was much quieter!

There was a good sized boab tree near the creek.  There was a sign on it and I expected it to say something about how old the tree was.  Nope, it was an old warning sign that crocodiles inhabit the creek.  Boab trees are becoming more plentiful as we move west.  This is a big one.

Bonus cute toddler pic for the grandparents.  Love my boy, he’s getting so big. 

Swimming at Edith Falls

After visiting the war cemetery and saying a quick hello to Charlie the Water Buffalo we hopped in the car and headed toward Katherine.  We had spent several nights in Katherine on our way north and were happy to head back to the same caravan park.  On the way we made a quick stop at Edith Falls for a swim.  It’s part of Nitmiluk National Park, the same national park that Katherine Gorge is in.

We donned our new snorkels & masks and headed in to the warm water.  One thing about travelling this late in the season- the water is always warm!  No crocs here, but plenty of fish and some of them were feeling a bit nippy that day.

We hopped in at the first water access point we came across.  This put us in a shallow area next to a bit of an island.  In the first picture at the top of this post you can get an idea of how far away we were from the falls.  I think I read that it was a 100 metre swim to reach the falls.  The part we were in felt more like a river.  There were lots of fish around, even coming up onto the steps where you get in the water which made them easy for TurboBug (2) to spot.  A good place for snorkelling as long as you are careful not to disturb the sediment at the bottom or your view will become very murky!

TurboBug wasn’t interested in staying in one place for long, so we walked down to the next water access point to have a look.  We’d both had a swim and neither of us were that interested in getting back in.  He loved the steps but it was obvious the water was deeper here.  I was glad I didn’t have to go in after him.

I seem to have several somewhat identical pictures of the falls.  :)  I know it doesn’t seem so from these pictures but there were several people around.  A few were making that 100m swim out to the falls.  There was a grassy picnic area and as TurboBug and I walked back to meet the others we passed a rather large tour group headed that way.  We got out just in time!

We had intended to walk up to the upper pools at Edith Falls, but it was boiling hot when we arrived.  We had our hats and water ready, but really we only had to get out of the car to realise we couldn’t put ourselves through that.  I’ve seen some stunning pictures and was sorry to miss it but it couldn’t be helped.  The kids enjoyed the swim in the plunge pool and I think they were relieved we didn’t make them walk in that heat.  We stayed maybe an hour or so and then got back in the car to finish our drive to Katherine.  We only spent one night in Katherine this time around as we wanted to get moving and make our way to WA.  We made sure to have one more lovely swim in those hot springs before we left!

Adelaide River War Cemetery

Somewhere I read that the war cemetery in Adelaide River is Australia’s only war cemetery.  I’m not sure if that’s accurate, it’s certainly not the only place that military are buried but maybe it’s the only one dedicated solely to the military?  Whether it is the only one or not, we knew this was one to visit.  The town’s population swelled after the initial bombing in Darwin during WWII as people fled the coast and many of the injured were brought here.

We stopped in the morning we left the town of Adelaide River to head south toward Katherine.  It was a hot, hot day so our visit had to be a quick one.

The lawn and gardens are impeccably maintained.  They were even working on them on that hot day we visited.  There’s a small informal museum outside the cemetery which tells the stories of many of the people buried here.  Altogether there are 434 war graves here.

It didn’t take long for the kids to find flowers to place on the headstones.  These beautiful white flowers are from the frangipani tree and are found all over the Top End.  The kids were collecting them off the ground and placing them on graves all over the cemetery.  I felt a little bad that someone would have to collect and remove them but I loved the sentiment from the kids all the same.  Every grave should have flowers, every life should be remembered.  They did the same at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, collecting poppies off the ground and placing them next to names on the wall.

‘His Duty Fearlessly and Nobly Done, Ever Remembered.’

‘Resting Where No Shadows Fall.’

‘Duty Nobly Done.’

I love this picture that LadyBug took.  This is the Memorial to the Missing which lists 292 names of servicemen and women lost to the north of Australia who have no known grave.

There is a civil section adjacent to the war cemetery.  Here you find the graves of the nine post office workers who were killed in the initial bombing of Darwin by Japan on 19 February 1942.  We’d learned of these deaths during our visit to Darwin, it’s mentioned often in war stories since they were civilians and all were killed together that day.

On the way out LadyBug happened to spy a cicada shell sticking to this post.  I don’t know how she could see it amongst all the coloured rocks. 

TurboBug insisted on putting it back where we found it and to my surprise it was still sticky enough to stay there.

On a lighter note, we also stopped into the local pub for a picture with Charlie, the water buffalo from the movie Crocodile Dundee.  Remember when Mick Dundee hypnotises him in the movie?  Charlie was a local celebrity and now stands proud in the local inn.  My kids haven’t seen the movie yet so were a little underwhelmed but they humoured us and enjoyed seeing how big he was. 

If they’d had a copy of the movie I might have purchased a copy, it’s one of those movies that you have to see if you live in Australia.  I remember going to see it in the theatre with my parents and absolutely loving it.  I just looked it up and next year will be the 30th anniversary of the movie, I’m sure it will be easy to find a copy then.  :)