Outback Adventure - Day 7

Devil's Marbles - Tennant Creek - Renner Springs - Daly Waters - Mataranka

Today's route: All the way up into the tropical Top End.

After a long an painful search for the best way to sleep in the passenger seat of a Land Cruiser, I can confirm that that position does not exist. It is merely a painful exercise in futility.

I lie and watch black turn to grey and finally the pink and orange of first light. I wake Eli up. She is not exactly a barrel of laughs either. Apparently, the back seat offers no sleeping comforts either.

We make coffee, brush teeth and head off at 7:15. We have a long day of driving ahead and neither of us have had any sleep of note.

Sunrise over the marbles.

More sunrise

First light hitting an outcrop.

After about 5km we hear a flappy kind of rattle coming from the top of the car. We pull over to discover a fully opened roof tent. The canvas cover have become loose and the wind has blown the tent open. After some swearing, the tent is well secured and we set off again.

A minute later the same thing happens again. A car comes from ahead and flashes his lights at us. Yes, dipshit, I am aware of the tent on my roof. Several choice swearwords are employed. Various cars, tents, rental agencies, natural phenomena and countries are covered.

We realise that the rain has weakened the velcro bonds securing the canvas covering. Added to this is the fact that only 2 of the 8 tie-down straps are actually functional. Just as well Eli sent me back to the camping shop in Alice to buy a bungee cord. This is employed to tie the tent down proper.

40 Minutes into our trip and we have covered 5 km.We both had a night very short on sleep and now we discover mechanical problems with our kit too. From a pretty low base my mood is deteriorating yet further.

We stop at Tennant Creek for diesel. 80 litres for 490km!

161km further north we stop at Renner Springs for coffee and breakfast. It is 9:30 in the morning and already stupid hot. There seems to be less flies, though. At the petrol station I spot a road train with 4 trailers. 82 Wheels on that monster!

The first thing you see as you approach Renner Springs.

The hotel proper. Quite nice, actually.

Eli manages some sleep on the way here, so she takes the next shift to Daly Waters. I try to sleep, but no luck. I use the time to get the diary up to date.

The road north.

Daly Waters is 250km to the north. Things become greener, almost imperceptibly. We stop at Daly Waters for lunch and a beer. It is the oldest pub in the Northern Territory, with a liquor licence valid since the 1880's. It a a lovely, charming pub set in a magnificent, desert-isolation, setting. I could stay here for a day or two. We have our beers in the shaded courtyard and our salad lunch in the shade of a tree. Shade is a godsend. It is midday and the tropical humity has kicked in.

Daly Waters Pub.

Eli takes the next driving shift as well as we head further north. About 300km to go. I take over after a hundred or so. During the changeover I manage to let a few flies into the cabin. I consider giving them each a name, in order to be able to curse them each personally, rather than as a species.

Driving is hard going. I have trouble concentrating, but Eli is in even a worse state and she has done the most of the driving already. I tore a fingernail two days earlier and it has become infected, and throbbing, no doubt helped on by stress, poor sleep and no showers for 36 hours.

At this stage it becomes clear that we are not in the Red Centre any more. The world is greener, with more rolling hills and new types of plants. The grass is high and green, the trees are taller, greener and healthier.

You can't leave Australia without a photo like this. So here it is.

This is what they refer to. Shy little cuties.

After a seeming eternity we arrive in Mataranka. It is 5pm, fucking hot and fucking humid. We need food, water, beer and wine, since tomorrow is Good Friday and nothing will be open. Without beer, I might need to call it Not So Good Friday. This is a roughneck town. I am the smallest guy in the supermarket. Even the checkout chicks will probably be able to floor me if I look at them askew. They are friendly enough, though. No food worth eating to be had here, but I do manage to get a slab of Tooheys New.

We have planned to go to Katherine, another 120km or so, but we decide that this is far enough. There is a hot spring about 10km further on, at Mataranka Homestead, which styles itself as a 'resort'. We are both gatvol, scratchy, tired, dirty, sticky and warm. All of our clothes are dirty and will need a wash before the 4 days that we intend to spend in Kakadu.

We rent a motel room at Mataranka Homestead for the night. Eli, the angel that she is, sends me off to go find a beer and some shade, while she puts the washing in. Two beers later Eli arrives and we wander through the rainforest to the hot spring. The water flows into a crystal clear rockpool where we float about, look at at the sky through the palm canopy, listen to the calls of cockatoos and generally feel our muscles relax and our cares wash away. We reluctantly get out when it gets dark.

We head to the fan-cooled bar where we drink G&T's and generally chill out. Dinner is pan fried barramundi and chips, eaten in the bar. Very good indeed.

We go back to our room, set the air-con to 'Arctic' and take looong showers. Bliss!

Read on to Day 8...