Home sweet home!

Cool colours eh! We would definitely not win any home beautiful awards but it's very cheerful.

Right now and for the next however many months, our backyard is the great outdoors enjoyed from our little travel pod - with the extension of Facebook of course! Here's a couple of pix of our gypsy caravan to show you what a wee space we survive in - but it is soo comfy and cosy! The kitchen merges with the 'living' space and that in turn merges with the 'bedroom'.

All my wash-cloths are rainbow colours too! We have broken with the
fashion trendiods and are blazing a new look on uncoolness!!

This is my cooking space. Amazing what you can do in a small space.
Just have to be a little careful and economical with cooking pans.
The weird thing in the top right corner is a carnival mirror - all distorted and weird.
Helps me maintain a sense of perspective and not get too serious

And talking of kitchens, I think some of you travel with caravan or camper and I definitely know that so many of you are fabulus cooks - I've tried your yummy cooking. So how about digging out and sharing one or two of your favourite recipes for taking 'on the road'. You can send them to me at hwheat42@gmail.com and I'll post them on my Pinging Chook blog with full acknowledgement, but of course. Drinks will be on me when I see you next!

www.thepingingchook.blogspot.com

​I love a sunburnt country! June or any other time.

Dorothea Mackellar - she was 19 in England and homesick fro Australia when she wrote 'My Country'

'My country' (posted below) - how right you were, Dorothea (it's worth going back to that poem we learnt at school so you might see what I'm talking about). We've been travelling in the Savannah for what seems like weeks and still it pulls at my heart strings. Grasses short and clustered and feather-topped spindly, towering higher than an elephant's eye, shaded in places by stunted eucalypts and other trees, even the strychnine tree, and bushes. Colours like you couldn't imagine. How many shades of green can you describe? They seem to be endless forming a continuum from pale-yellow/buff green through ever darkening shades to almost black and fading then to soft blues and greys - and yes still green!
Still the chlorophyll works its magic in even the palest of silver grey green to allow the plants to absorb energy from the sun. Amazing isn't it!? And water!

Some water crossings were cool and shaded and quite lovely.

Other crossings? well you took a guess and aimed at the middle ..... or the side or .......
but here we are and the van was clean underneath for 5 mins

Some crossings were watery and we felt a bit like an army duck.

I don't recall the name of this river but the causeway was 3-400 m across and I could imagine how wild it would be when the water was coursing through after the wet. Warning signs say not to swim, not to walk across, not to stop. Must be a huge torrent when it is flowing!

This is taken from the other side of the causeway

Over the last week or more, we have crossed so many creeks - I think I have to call them waterways as labels like creek conjures up something sweet and bubbling somehow and not at all like what we have been encounter - some dry, some steep narrow gullies which challenge the caravan, wide stretches of water, rocky outcrops, bearing evidence of floods with flattened trees. Some which were 300-400m wide with warnings not to walk across! I can't help but wish I could see it all in the wet. Of course access would be somewhat difficult! and that's the time when crocs wander the 'roads'. Did I mention that during a recent big wet in Katherine, they found a croc in the supermarket when the water subsided! Eek!!!!

Some were sandy and we kept the revs up to avoid getting bogged. We both remembered very vividly having to dig ourselves out of the Simpson desert. Shudder!

Many crossings were shallow expanses of water and sand shaded by pandanus and trees.

This one was a Big Dipper. We had to keep check on our eager beast lest she take the crossing at a
gallop and rip the bottom out of the van. It was a bit 'whoa neddie but keep her going' all at the same time.

People visit WA for the wild flowers in spring but here we daily experience a parade of colour. Perhaps more subtle but glorious nevertheless. The soft pale puce of the Turkey bush flowers, the vivid yellows, orange, reds and green of the eucalypts and grevillea, and the subtle colours of clumping roadside flowers. Amongst which ant and termite mounds protrude in colours from dark red through orange to browns the shades of which match the hew of surrounding land.

Poor shot but this is turkey bush. The flowers are very pretty feathery stars.
One could not always stop where we would have liked. But you'll get the idea.

I know that I tend to the romantic and rather fey, but as Julia said, 'the devil is in the detail' or in my case, the beauty is in the detail. It is quite magical if only you look!
And then we arrived at Hell's Gate - the Roadhouse! It was a veritable oasis; what a delightful surprise it was.

An airport, an international one at that and in the middle of nowhere.
Look up Hells Gate on the map and you'll understand what I mean.

Cool shady lawns and huge spreading trees - and masses of birds.

My Country
The love of field and coppice
Of green and shaded lanes,
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins.
Strong love of grey-blue distance,
Brown streams and soft, dim skies
I know, but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests,
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon,
Green tangle of the brushes
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops,
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When, sick at heart, around us
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the rainbow gold,
For flood and fire and famine
She pays us back threefold.
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze ...

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand
though Earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.

**
Dorothea Mackeller

​Malandarri Festival Borroloola June 2017

This was the pattern of the body painting on many of the performers and children alike

Dancers in the dark, in the sand and under the stars. Two marvellous nights to remember! A community and regional celebration of traditional and contemporary arts and cultural practices of the four clans in the area. The kids, including some local white kids, joined in most performances. In fact we ended up being treated to a veritable multicultural smorgasbord - not just dancers from the families (men, women and children) in the region but also Bollywood, Fijian and Tahitian performances.

Fipe Preuss is a Tahitian, living in Melbourne but
was helping event manage the Festival.

The Fijian team! The music was very moving

This energetic dancer performed some 'traditional' Indian as well as Bollywood numbers

The kindergarten children performed a couple of numbers, sung both in English and Yanyuwa.

You can watch some of the dancing on YouTube by pasting these links into your browser: Tahitian dance https://youtu.be/GLnbIUpKKSQ and Fijian dance https://youtu.be/HwLWtG7TyS0 All wrapped in the echoes of the haunting sounds of the didgeridoo and the singing mainly of the old women https://youtu.be/l34eo9BejVw

The singers sat in a row. Mostly it was the old women but here some male elders
were providing the singing and didgeridoo backing. The dances were telling
stories which I was wishing I could understand.

The night ended with a couple of local bands which had heaps of people up dancing. I think Lindsay almost got up!!!

Everyone, well almost everyone, got painted and wore white cockatoo feathers.
 It looked spectacular. This little cherub sat playing for ages in the sand

​Dugong, green turtles and li-Anthawirriyarra

Apologies up front for the lack of pix but I have been feeling my way here so am a bit wary not to overstep any sensitive boundaries. Apologies also for all the words. Can this woman talk or what! Sorry but it is all so interesting and I really want to share it with you. So. .... I'll get on with it 😁
Every day a new revelation it seems! A couple of days ago we encountered a couple of Yanyuwa (I found out later) people busy on the boat ramp at Mule Creek, which in my book was a pretty much a river but ..... look at Cooper creek! Names and classifications leave me wondering. Anyway this 'creek' is one of a multitude of waterways emptying into the Gulf. I was curious to know what they were doing (I thought they had giant turtles) so I hopped out of the car and asked, respectfully of course - if you don't reach out and make contact, you remain forever apart. They had just caught a couple of dugong and were cleaning/stripping them. Looked gruesome but intriguing. Turns out they were preparing meat for a festival this weekend - Malandarri. They had caught and killed these creatures in the traditional way with a wooden harpoon. No good being squeamish, just that one doesn't see ones meat butchered everyday (it comes sanitised and wrapped). Turtles were also being hunted by the li-Anthawirriyarrs (Sea Rangers). They were after the green turtle, according to their law. We chatted for quite a while - thank goodness they were open to my questions. They ended up inviting us to come to the festival. How could you refuse! So we have stayed on so we can. It starts tonight and then we'll be off on another bit of dirt road. This annual festive is all about celebrating the art and cultural practices of the four main language/clan groups living in the area. There'll be dance, traditional food, school kids doing something, and other cultural activities. Aboriginal groups are expected to be coming from far and wide.
Sounds pretty amazing! Got to go with the flow of this ancient land eh!? I spoke to some aunties yesterday and they told me what they'd be cooking. I also got an invitation to go see them practicing their dance and songs over at the art and cultural centre today. Lovely ladies. They were sitting on a big rug in the shade of some huge trees chomping on kangaroo tail cooked in foil in the fire. Looked pretty ok to me albeit a little ash flecked - but hey they increase the price of cheese if it's rolled in ash, right?
Also we spent some time chatting to a couple of the il-Anthaeirriyarra Sea Rangers at their station. I wanted to know what they do etc etc and hoped to find out if we could get to Barranyi (North Island National Park in the Pellew Island group). Their role is to monitor and protect the waters and islands in this region. Two of the clans are responsible for the sea, rivers and islands (and the other two for the land). In collaboration with a couple govt groups, they care for and monitor the health of the turtles and dugong, the waters and sea grasses etcetc of the Yanyuwa indigenous protected area.
I have had the most marvellous opportunity to learn a little about these people and their ancient cultures and feel very honoured.
Now off to watch the aunties and learn some new steps! Tomorrow hopefully some pix from the festivities tonight.

The showground getting ready to party!

​June 12-17 Borroloola

Home sweet home!

Typical of Savannah grasslands. We look out on this from our van. Quite lush at the moment. I believe during the wet the caravan park is an island with the river flowing around parts of its perimeter. That would be a sight!

We have been hunkered down in Borroloola for quite a few days and have really enjoyed it. It's rather an interesting, albeit not entirely pretty, place with a surprising history. When I say surprising, that is entirely due to my ignorance - up till now and now I am even more impressed! The place has been on my 'places to visit' list since we first came to the Gulf country 7 years ago. Back then from Burketown, situated near the Qld-NT border and another frontier town with its own fascinating difficult past, I looked west along the Savannah Way on the map and saw Hells Gate and Borroloola. I decided then and there to one day go there. With names like that, who wouldn't?
The town of Borroloola was established in the 1880s and currently has a pop of about 1000 made up of non-aboriginal plus four main aboriginal communities/distinct language groups. It's situated on the mighty McArthur River 50k upstream from the Gulf where Bing Bong Port is located - on Bing Bong Creek of course! Just love that name, makes me laugh. Zinc and lead are loaded and shipped out of that port. Maybe other ores also as the region is rich in many minerals including gold, diamonds, silver, tin, copper as well as shale and oil. Most of these were discovered back on the late 1800s but are only now been mined economically. I was flabbergasted to learn that Australia's largest diamond weighing in at 104 carats was found here about 15 years ago. Super eh!?

Port Bing Bong with Gulf in the background from the viewing tower.

Port Bing Bong from 'the beach'.

We've explored lots of the roads around here over the last few days not to mention the road to Caranbirini Conservation reserve and its magnificent rock formations. We've driven down every water access road we could find, mostly that's been onto the McArthur or Batten river/creek. These are huge rivers and one can only wonder at the volume of water they carry during the wet. We drove up to the port and to a small creek, Mule Creek - 100m wide! Hello!? we are definitely in big water country here. We even managed a walk on the shore of the Gulf - at low tide and way beyond where a croc would want to come. That in itself was pretty specky as so much of the Gulf is mangrove or totally inaccessible - says she who knows so little of its coastline.

The Gulf of Carpentaria, or part thereof, viewed from a safe distance from the water. Sorry you'll have to zoom in to see the water 😞 These waters are home to big croc - as well as the gentle dugong and turtle.

Thought I'd add a bit of fluff! We were surrounded by 'pipecleaner bushes. The dropped 'flowers' were gathered like polystyrene balls in protected hidey holes. Took me a while to work out what they were

There are quite a few small island groups off shore in this area, e.g., the Sir Edward Pellew group which we would have dearly loved to visit. One is a National park where turtles nest. Sadly without a boat we're stumped. Haven't entirely given up but I think it's a dream for another day. If you're interested you can volunteer to help out at the annual turtle monitoring camp on West Island: Note to self.
It's been quite a revelation visiting this place and a wonderful experience. You should try it!

June 14 - another magical day

After a relatively short walk we spotted the rock towers behind the trees.
Quite exciting! It was early morning and the air was still cool.

​Something magical about coming upon a place, having it slowly emerge bit by bit. It was like that yesterday. We visited Caranbirini Conservation Reserve and found 'the lost city'! A vast expanse of geological awesomeness (if that's a word) - 8 square K. A labyrinth of sandstone 'pillars' 20-30 metres high. Would you like a lesson in geology? Thought not BUT you wander and wonder! How on earth .....? It all started when sediment laid down in a shallow sea bed compacted into sandstone over millions of years. That was raised by forces in the earths crust and after simply eons and other magic processes .... voila! Giant pillars of compacted sandstone.

Note the ripples in this huge rock. Very much like the ripples you see in the sand at low tide eh!? This suggests that these rocks were formed in a fairly shallow sea.

Erosion by wind and rain with the help of lots of other forces big and small like the naughty little Rock Fig which relies on tiny wee fissures to anchor itself to the rock face. It's roots swell with rain and so the cycle goes on and on. And as with other forces, rock fractures slowly develop, more erosion and .... voila encore! So that's how the caverns and canyons form leaving towering edifices for us to marvel at. But what about the rest I hear you say, the towers? Thought you'd want to know!

This is a rock fig poking its roots into any tiny nook and cranny.
Tenacious little things ... and so the world was populated!

Well it seems that rain water seeps into the rock dissolving iron and other goodies. Then during the dry season the water slowly evaporates drawing the iron etc to the surface where it hardens to form a coating of iron oxide which reduces erosion. Simple. Remember the desert pavement, the gibber plains of the Coober Pedy, painted desert region? Well it's the same thing. Cool eh!? Actually hot as it needs the sun for evaporation and for the iron to bake.

I wanted to point out the delicate green grass so soft looking beside the solid rock-giants it fanned. But NO this innocuous looking carpet, stabs and pricks leaving a smidgen of poison in your leg - spinafex! Looks great but ..... it does however provide a perfect habitat for the spinafex pigeons and the rare and endangered Carpentaria grass wren. So there's a place for all things

Looking st this inverted triangle makes you wonder about the forces, strengths etc that hold everything together.

Bit like a crown. Many of the towers had caves like this one. Softer patch of rock once perhaps?

We clambered through secret caverns - ok not secret but one felt a bit like the girls in Picnic at Hanging Rock and were it not for the frequent little blue arrows one could imagine getting very lost.

Some were mere slits between sheer rock faces and yes, I did fit through in case you were wondering!
Note that thin ropey thing down the side? That's a tree root. There were trees and all sorts of plants and fern growing straight out from the rock faces.

We spent a few hours wandering and oohing and ahhing with me reading every sign - surprise!? Truly spectacular. I suspect on a par with the Bungle Bungles which we are yet to see.
As I wandered I decided that if I could choose 2 additional travelling companions (in addition to Lindsay, goes without saying!) it would be a geologist and a botanist. How wonderful to have the answers/explanations on hand.

I wonder who etched these hieroglyphs? Looks like some ancient manuscript.

Rows of holes like this had me intrigued. I've seen similar in the sandstone cliffs near Bondi. Of course I peered into them all to see if anything was lurking inside - as you do. But no, not a sausage

Aha I thought I'd found some rock art but alas no. This is the remains of a wasp nest. How terribly unromantic. But it does tell us that this magnificent rock city is home to many.

A little lace making had been going on prior to our visit. Exquisite isn't it!?

We spent the last hour of our visit in the cool of a bird hide watching birds dipping into a tranquil lagoon, hanging off the stalks of water lilies burrowing into the flowers from underneath after the nectar, Blue Wing kookaburras acting like the kingfishers they are, following the 'community' of Pygmy Geese busy having a wonderful time from one end of the lagoon to the other and ..... It was pretty amazing all round!

And after all that we emerged still saying wow!!

We spent an idyllic hour or so simply ogling