Tuesday August 25

Another morning after blog and what a night it was, we were treated to a huge spectacular light show. Actually it was in the early hours of this morning but the whole horizon was continually lit up by sheet lightning. It woke me up and after turning off our phones etc I watched for ages before going back to sleep listening to the rain washing our van. 

Tuesday started with a walk around the Devils Marbles taking a large number of photographs as the early morning sun created shadows and light changes on the marbles. It is a serious display of natures skill in creating marvels for us humans to see, quite beyond imagination. I seem to be running out of words to describe all the wonders that we are seeing on our travels, well you will just have put up with the repetition. 

The camp emptied fairly quickly with RVs heading either north or south. We joined the southward group aware that Alice Springs is getting fuller and fuller, but at this stage we will just have to create plans b,c,d,etc in case we can't get accommodation. Having said that we know that the caravan parks will be very expensive so we will use free parks if we can. So far it the NT has had very poor phone coverage, worse than WA and TV has been even worse so that Elaine has watched all her movies a number of times which means that we will have to get as part of our shopping in Alice. 

We passed through open speed zones which means we were able to take the van up to 250 kmh, just kidding. We did note however that the traffic passing us was not being silly and driving at speeds that were over the top. As we passed each of the open speed zone signs there were special sign boards 'Drive to conditions' with advice on how to be safe, unfortunately they were difficult to read whilst driving, however  these signs were also planted at intersections and on the exit roads of rest areas. We also passed a town called Aileron  which had a small hill behind it and on that hill was a statue of a giant aboriginal hunter complete with spear. At the door of the hill was a matching statue of a female, quite something to see!  

Then there was our first clouds for some time and a bit of lightning foreshadowing last nights storm. 

Monday August 24

Another lovely day on the road, but no telstra cover tonight so this blog will get published when we next get cover. 

My morning walk confirmed the wide open spaces campsite, I walked across the grassland to the tree line and back a good half hours walk but it was a nice campsite. Then after a bit of cleaning up we got back on the road heading west. The scenery was the now usual scrub with low trees and today not many hills. The first excitement of the day was Peter an Austrian cyclist who is 13 months into cycling around 100 kms per day and as yet has no definite plans to go home. We gave him a bottle of frozen water and a can of Pepsi which was much appreciated and made us feel good! Next we stopped at the restored telegraph building about 12 km north of Tennant Creek which was very interesting. We learnt that they kept their food cool by building a cellar which in this case is a small separate building. Then at the edge of the town The Mary Ann dam and recreational lake where there were ducks, swans, chooks and a family of peacocks (ie: peacocks, peahens and babies). Today was usual in the relatively large number of motorbikes on the road, I don't know why but we probably saw 20-30 of them. We fueled up at Tennant Creek after a slight delay due to a suspected gas leak, also at this time Tom reported that he was almost home. 

Tonight we are camped at a place called the Devils Marbles which amongst other things is a aboriginal sacred sight. It is quite spectacular with huge granite rocks balanced on each other quite precariously and they change colour as the sun shifts, obviously the effect of shadows etc. The camp is one of these super expensive, $6.60 per night, places run by the local shire and it is packed out with vans parked parallel to each other about 3 metres apart.