Hi to you all,
This is the April edition of our blog. We left Ballarat on the March 28 with our first stopped being at the SA/Vic border free camp. This is our first test of free camping in our new van, it passed the test.
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| A friend visiting us at Crystal Brook in Warrendyte |
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| The SA/Vic border plaque |
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| Set up for a free night at the SA/Vic border |
From the border we headed to another free camp at Port Parham (recommended by the Hagedorn's & Wagstaff's. It was a nice stopped but so many people camped we were lucky to fine a place to camp. As this was of wedding anniversary we went out to the sports club for dinner. What a great place, we had free drinks because we were celebrating, all the staff where volunteers.
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| Looks good all together |
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| Odd tractor at Port Parham for putting in fishing boats |
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| Tractors putting fining boats, big mud flats |
From Port Parham we went onto Port Augusta for the night, another night in Cober Peddy, form here the head wind was bad, we had another free night at the NT/SA border then onto Stuarts Well for the night, we unhitched and drove out to the Henbury Meteorite Craters. On the way we passed this photo op on the side of the road. The site of the first and only Cannonball Run, this memorial is for the crash that happened in 1994.
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| Photo op sign on the Stuart Highway |
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| Willy willy whirling the dust across the paddocks |
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| Ian looking at the memorial |
From Stuarts Well we headed back down the road to see the Henbury Craters, this has been on our list for a while, the area is different to the Wolf Creek Crater in that there are quite a few and small but quite interesting to walk around the ring of the largest. When we returned to the caravan park we had dinner in the roadhouse, the food was great, not a lot of people around.
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| The road into the Henbury Craters |
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| One of the craters |
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| General area looking back toward the road |
From Stuarts Well we headed in to Alice Springs and stayed at the MacDonnell Range Caravan Park, as it happened to be the 30 th. celebrations stay 4 nights, then it was on to Tennent Creek, Hi Way Inn @ Daly Waters and onto Katherine for 2 nights. We arrived at Maree & Russell's. We had a great few days with them. We stayed in Darwin for 2 weeks over Easter, Darwin was very hot and humid our airconditor went 24/7. After leaving Darwin we now went south again to stay at Douglas Daly Tourist Park and went to the hot springs, the water in places is very hot, bubbling up out of the sand. We did a drive along the creek at the park.
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| The creek that rang through the caravan park |
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| This is The Arches, big rocks, lots of water |
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| The Arches from a different point |
The following morning we wen to the hot springs about 14 km's from the park and soaked in the water for ages returning to the park for lunch then in the truck again for a drive to Oolloo Crossing on the Daly River.
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| Looking left from the steps at the hot springs |
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| Looking right from the steps at the hot springs |
On the endless road to the Oolloo Crossing, we past Sandalwood & African Maghoneny plantations, cattle, grain and lots of water birds.
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| The road to Oolloo Crossing |
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| Smoke & clouds along the way |
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| Ian in our truck crossing a creek along the way |
We drove at least 30 km's and still didn't find the Oolloo Crossing, I guess we didn't go far enough. Something else for the next drive up the Stuart Highway. From there went stayed in Katherine again for a night then onto Victoria River Roadhouse for a night and fish & chips for tea. It was so nice last year so we stopped again, just as nice second time round. That ends April so I will continue the story in the next blog. For those of you that have not seen our new caravan inside I have included a couple of shots of it.
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| from the bedroom toward the bathroom |
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| Living and dinning area |
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| Bedroom |
We are now in Broome and all setup for our stay. The truck has been running well (apart from the head winds), the caravan is great.
Love Marilyn & Ian
