Repacking the panniers and folding camping gear was slow going this morning. I had gone for a long walk to see the falls and cliffs of this part of the park, but the focus had been on stretching and freeing up the painful area in my back. The river was beautiful,


and the crocodile trap was a reminder not to swim


The front toilet block also had a shower with hot water so I aimed the nozzle at the offending part of my back, which along with the movement, helped. They were the most interesting toilets for the trip so far.



Another 10am start, I rode my way back to the highway and the 60kms to Katherine. I stopped for a nice cooked breakfast and large mug of coffee and was feeling human again.

Another 100 metres down the road was the shopping complex where I bought some breakfast things, fresh fruit and slipped into the pharmacy for some much needed pain-killers and anti-inflammatories. It was only another 100kms to Mataranka Springs where I pulled in with the mercury approaching 40C.

The springs were as I remember them. At around 33C, the springs form part of the Roper River in the Elsey Conservation Reserve. The surrounds have a walking path and stone walls, almost resembling a swimming pool. Tall palms full of thousands of red flying foxes surround the area with their calls and quarrels echoing through the dense canopy.



I relaxed in the water for a good hour and a half, reminding me why this is an oasis and a must to visit. The homestead with overpriced campsites - $24 unpowered – is at the entrance to the park.

I decided to use the hammock tonight as there were two solid straight trees and a shady spot to park Ziggy. I felt it may rain as it has for most nights since I’ve been in the Territory so I set up the parachute tarp – still unsure if it has earned it’s place in the kit yet.


I completed the camp set up, covered Ziggy and walked to the bar area for a refreshing lemon, lime and bitters. The heavens opened up and continued pouring for three hours, amongst some spectacular thunder and lightning.


I waited for the rain to stop before picking my way through the muddy ground to the hammock. My bed was dry. Bonus!

Attached Thumbnails

 

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G'day Paul,
Enjoying reading about your travels and adventures mate. Your photo's are wetting my appetite to travel the top end. Safe travels and keep the updates coming!

Cheers

Barry

Thanks for your comments Barry and welcome to HU!

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I stayed for two nights at Mataranka to rest up and experience some wildlife




then packed up camp and decided to spend the day at Bitter Springs, another spring within the same river system and same National Park, but a little further north of Mataranka.



After some relaxing meditation and chillout time in the water, I walked back to the bike and cooked up some pasta for lunch.


It is the wet season but the sky looked like this.


This is where I met Steve and Jo, and their six kids. The youngest was adopted from the Philippines. They had been travelling around Australia from Tasmania since August, in much the same manner I was. Find a place, stay, do the activities then move to another place. They home-schooled the kids and I don’t think I have met a family that is so close. They would all stand around to tell a story of a place they had been on the trip, and five of them would fill in bits of the story as they went. It was like how twins finish each others’ sentences, but this was the whole family doing it.


We hung out for a while, Steve was a really interesting guy who built strawbale houses and a range of other things.

At the end of the day I said my farewells and headed down to the camping area in the National Park and told them that I had found the Mataranka Homestead a bit expensive for a patch of mud and no power. No sooner had I set up the tent and in came the van, making us the only campers in what ended up being a very large and extensive camping area.


We ate together and chatted about travel and bikes and travel again. The sleeping setup in the van was amazing with kids sharing single bunks and beds placed in the tightest of places. But these kids, ranging from 15 to 2yrs, were all happy and helpful to each other. Their behavior and maturity really impressed me.

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Hi faithful readers. Just to let you know that this trip has now finished and I am in Brisbane, but I'm working at posting the whole story as I can get Internet access.

Please bear with me!

PN

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Over Breakfast, Steve and Jo said they were going to visit the waterfall, a four kilometre bushwalk. Without hesitation all the kids donned their hiking shoes, water packs and off we went. It was really hot again, approaching 40C, and these kids just went along without complaint, the older ones waiting for and helping the younger ones.




Not exactly the biggest falls on the planet!




Steve told me about the things he had done with his kids such as white water rafting, canoeing, hiking into the mountains in Tasmania, camping in the snow, various swimming holes. It seems that there was nothing he wouldn’t take the kids to do, if he could do it, he’d take the six kids and they would all help each other get there. It was a different type of parenting that I wasn’t accustomed to but couldn’t help be impressed by. Their cohesiveness as a family was rock solid.

After a photo shoot around Ziggy, we said our farewells and as I headed south, they headed north. Farewell lovely people. Travel safe.

It was hot. After the walk I didn’t leave until nearly 1pm, so I stopped back at Mataranka for a cold drink and a fruit salad to fuel me up a bit. The temperature gauge hit 43.5C at one point and hovered between 41 and 43. Seriously hot riding and I felt quite tired today.

I arrived at the town of Daly River and pulled into the caravan park near where I planned to turn off the main highway for a while. I walked into the cool office/bar/restaurant and asked for their prices.

Basic room – $110
Cabin - $120
Deluxe Cabin - $130

Do you have camping?
Yes. Powered site $25

Do you have unpowered sites?
Really? Yes. $7.
Does that include the pool?
Of course.
I’ll take it!

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BIG day in the saddle. At just before 7am I took the road to Borooloola but was undecided as to whether I would go all the way and head up to the coast and camp or turn right at Cape Crawford towards Barkly Homestead.
The road looked like this


I stopped at a rest area and practiced a Tiffany type self with my camera on the helmet on the ground


Via Borooloola would cut of over 500kms, but a combination of 250kms of dirt, numerous river crossings, back still giving me pain, overloaded and recent rains, all contributed to my decision, that I made eating lunch at the Heartbreak. I opted to go straight to Barkly Homestead and do some long miles.


I set off at 1pm, fuelled up body and bike – at a price -


to take on the thin red line on my map. Not much choice paying those prices


The road looked like this.


Some hundred or so kilometres into it, I had a rest…I wasn’t the first!



Not everyone makes it.


Thanks for the warning, I think it’s wandering stock!

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I'd love to know where to get a little winch like that, even given its shortcomings. I cannot lift my bike either, due to "great age and decrepitude" and the results of trying to fly an aeroplane through a tree years ago. (Hint: don't try this at home..)

Dave Barr, the epic legless RTW biker, used an electric winch mounted on his crash bars to complete his "Southern Cross Tour", a few years ago, but I'd rather not have the weight or expense.

Rob

Hey Rob, the winch was made by Adventure Engineering in the US but he has pulled the product from sale. I believe he is working on a newer version that will have a stop-type ratchet on it to hold the weight in position when you stop pulling. It's tiny and lightweight and without it I may still be stranded in the National Park! Google Adventure Engineering, the owner is named Victor and he gets back quick with emails. I believe a few years ago he offered it in bulk to ADV Rider members at a reduced price.

Hope that helps. Regards, PN

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Another early start


– getting good at this – and hit the normal highway to the Queensland border. The day started with a dust storm that made the road look like this.


It was hot, generally hovering between 42C and 44.5C after 8am.

There were a lot of creek and river crossings that didn’t have water, so when I saw one with water, I became excited and snap happy. Ziggy is such a poser!


As we approached the desolate and now windy AND hot Queensland border, I reminded Ziggy that this would be the last of these signs.


Hello Queensland.


First town I arrived at was Camooweal.


Slightly underwhelmed, I rode forth. These places became my friend.


Some had water supplied, some didn’t, some had tanks that had no water in them. Some hills appeared in the distance, an indicator that Mt Isa was looming…that meant bends! My poor tyres were becoming quite flat-footed with all these straight roads.


Mt Isa.


Hot.


Had to find somewhere to stay. I rode into town and treated myself to a cool drink and frittata at one of the local clubs. I hit the iPhone checking Booking.com, Wotif.com, Google, Maps With Me and Trip Advisor to find some accommodation.

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Hotels were $140 upwards, as were cabins at the caravan parks. Camping it was again. I had a lovely site for $7 at Barkly Homestead, $14 - $15 was the norm for an unpowered site elsewhere, so I was less than impressed with quotes of $28 and $34 from two of the parks for an unpowered site!

I decided to go and check out the local lake.


It was empty of people. Maybe due to blue-green algae in the water.


It was hot, so I took off my riding clothes and sat under a shelter for a while.

I had to accept that these camping prices were the norm for a mining town so I thought at least I would check out the facilities for $28. I picked up a couple of supplies from Coles and went to the park where I was shown to a shadeless bit of dirt under the clotheslines and between some miner’s huts.

What exactly do I get for my $28??
This is it.
Well I think I’ll take my travelling dollars elsewhere, thanks.

I walked back to the bike sitting in the blazing sun of a 44 degree carpark, and a rather large fellow with a significantly more mature goatee than mine walked up and said g’day.
G’day
Wher’ve you come from?
Broome.
Well you’ve got the right bike for that. I ride a Harley but I’d never do a trip like that on it. It’s more a town bike.
Right then.
Ya camping here?
No. (Quick explanation of my dislike of the value for money at this caravan park)
Yeah I know what you mean. It used to be a lot better but with Cat. 3 water restrictions and new management, it’s pretty much gone to shit. You will find the same sorts of prices elsewhere but no doubt you’ll find a nicer site.

He kindly gave directions to the other caravan parks.

Try those.
Thanks heaps for your help.
No worries. I love bikers man and I’d hope someone would help me the same way. Take it easy and I hope you find a good spot.
Thanks mate, much appreciated!

The directions led me accurately to the Sunset Top Tourist Park. Sign said $22 for an unpowered site.

G’day
Gday
I’m looking for an unpowered site.
Yep we’ve got some of those.
Any grass?
Not really.
Anywhere for a hammock?
Yep. I’ve got a shady spot down by the river with a couple of trees you can hang a hammock on. Ride down and have a look and if you want it, come back and let me know. No-one else down there at the moment.

I rode through the park and ducked between sites 48 and 49, and came to a long strip of flat ground with a few mature gum trees at the end. I found two trees exactly the right distance apart for my hammock. There was a placid river with ducks and geese and even a few lizards running around. I walked back to the office.




Done deal.
No worries. That will be $15.
Really?
I can charge you more if you want.
Fifteen’s good, thanks.

Steve the owner came down while I was setting up. He told me he was a biker and a traveller and he and his wife Julie are getting their gear together for a long trip around the world in a campervan. He told me about every biker that had been there in the last two years, and he was very interested in my gear.

Highly recommended biker friendly place to camp in Mt Isa!!!

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Steve and Julie came down for a chat in the morning and we exchanged details. They will be there for the next year to eighteen months, so if you’re passing this way, drop in and enjoy their welcome.

I’d found it a bit frustrating that there had been no wifi anywhere I had stayed so far on the trip and I hadn’t had the opportunity or option to drop in at McDonalds and partake of their free wifi. There was a Maccas in Mt Isa!

I sat down with a large coffee and spent the next hour and a half trying unsuccessfully to upload my ride tale and photos on HU. Each time I had the photos loaded, the connection would drop out. Maccas staff explained that this was the time in the day they do all their downloading so it is particularly slow.

I watched my riding time for the day disappearing, so left without having started my trip report. Apologies, but this all happened a while ago by the time you read it!

After stopping to fuel up Ziggy, where I had a very nasty stare from a young women on a McDonalds diet for upsetting some protocol of which bowser to pull up to, I was on my way for a short 120kms to Cloncurry for lunch.

Cloncurry has an historic importance to me. In my younger days, 1984 to be exact, I drove the route from Cairns via Normanton, the route I’m about to retrace for the first time since; and when I arrived at the intersection a short distance to the west, I stopped and flicked a coin. Heads Adelaide, tails Darwin.

It was heads. In 2008 I finally completed the loop back to that intersection from Darwin. This time I’ll be heading back to Normanton, which I didn’t do in 2008. I wonder if anything has changed since 1984? I’m getting ahead of myself.

Before I arrived in Cloncurry, this trip, 2013, I stopped at Mary Joseph ruins. It is an odd place, a ghost town with absolutely no structures left, just slabs of concrete where houses once stood, and streets with gutters and roundabouts.




It was a far cry from my recent Roman ruin visit in Morocco



but one can only wonder about the daily life that used to go on here and how it came to be as it is today. Despite being deep in contemplation of the past, I tried one of Tiffany’s self shots while riding, from the camera sitting on the helmet. Not a bad first effort.


Besides all that, the road from Mt Isa to Cloncurry is quite interesting with very arid, tough looking ranges, beautiful in its harshness, even at 44 degrees.

At last I was on my way back to Normanton after 29 years. On the way was a quaint little pub at Quamby, the Pub in the Scrub. It was closed. Not much good for anything.


The countryside became very outback, harsh, hot, unforgiving, even Ziggy needed a rest in the shade.


There were some low ranges in the distance. The scrub was dry and repetitive, but surprisingly tinged with green.


Not even the creeks seemed happy.


And it just kept getting hotter. My temp gauge often will read 44.5C and I have thought in the past that it had reached its limit. Today it reached 47 for a short time. Ouch. That equals my all time highest temperature I’ve been in.

The rocks don’t mind. They just sit in piles for millions of years.

But there are signs that I’m heading north again, back into the wet tropics. I stopped at the Burke and Wills Roadhouse for the night as the road to Normanton started becoming a single lane of bitumen. I reneged and took an air conditioned cabin for $60.

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