Nyngan

 
 

We had another long drive today but were very happy to set up camp on the river and start collecting fire wood for roasting marshmallows tonight. We collected a lot of wood and then got the fire going. We enjoyed just sitting around, watching the fire and looking at the stars in the sky. We even saw a couple of satellites go by.

Tomorrow we are planning on going canoeing. They have a shed with a few canoes and paddles, so hopefully we can have a paddle on the river in the morning.

DAY 2:
The canoe cost nothing to hire today, so we walked 20 m from our van, put on our life jackets, found some paddles and off we went. We had a great time paddling down the river. I went with Dad and sand as he paddled

After a quick shop to get some more food in the afternoon, we started the fire again. Amazingly, it was still hot enough from last night and all we had to do was throw in a piece of paper and the coals caught alight!

We started the fire at about 2:45 and sat around it until dinner. For dinner we roasted potatoes in the hot coals of the fire – they tasted yummy! We ate dinner inside, but then had our ice creams that we had bought from the shop, back out at the fire.

Broken Hill - back in NSW !!!

 
 

This morning we left to go to Broken Hill. On the way we stopped at Petersborough and James and I got a finger bun while Dad and Mum got a coffee. The information centre we went to was actually an old train carriage. It had beds in it. After this we drove for a long time.

We arrived at Broken Hill and had lunch. As soon as we set up we went to the park (opposite our caravan site) . It had swings, round-a-bouts and springy toys. I also went for a run around the caravan park with Dad.

DAY 2:
This morning we went to the Information centre and got a key to go to the Desert Sculptures. As drove in and out of the Desert Park, we saw rock wallabies and kangaroos – I took some pictures of them with my camera. I also took lots of pictures of the Desert Sculptures. It was freezing out at the Sculptures because the wind was very strong.

At the Silver City Mint Museum we saw lots of paintings, but the biggest painting was 12 m x 100m. It was huge and felt like it was coming out at you. There was also a chocolate factory and they had lolly dummies, chocolate and fudge. I bought some strawberry fudge.

We then went to the Pro Hart gallery. Outside the gallery was a Rolls Royce car which Pro Hart had painted. Inside the gallery there were huge paintings of Australian outback scenes (gold diggers, bush rangers, mining life) as well as a dragon fly. It was interesting how with one painting he used a cannon to shoot Christmas baubles full of paint onto the canvas.

This afternoon we went to the Soda Factory where they make sodas like they did in the 1950’s. Since I don’t really like ice cream, I had a cherry ripe chocolate instead.

Port Augusta

 
 

Another day in the car, but we stopped for lunch at Woomera where rockets were launched. One of the sad stories was that Germany bombed England with missiles. So, Britain and Australia decided to build their own rockets during World War 2 and used Woomera to do this. We walked around the museum and saw lots of rockets and missiles – a few of the names were Black Arrow and Black Knight.

We stopped at Port Augusta (instead of Quorn) and it was cold and rainy. Today we to the movies and saw Ice Age 3 while I ate chicken chips.

Tomorrow we are driving to Broken Hill (NSW).

Coober Pedy

 
 
 

We travelled a lot today. We spent 9 ½ hours in the car and watched Star Wars and Shrek the Third. We also listened to ½ of the Nimbin, an audio book (thanks Mr and Mrs Blake!)

Everywhere you look there are little hills of sand where the people have mined. The main street which we drove through today (and will look at tomorrow) has many Opal stores for buying souvenirs and learning about the history of Opal mining.

Off to bed now because I am so tired from the long drive.

Day 2
This morning we went to the Old Timer’s Mine and we found heaps of opals “noodling” in the pit at the entrance. In the mine we saw dummies dressed up as miners to show us how they mined for opals, tools that they used and the underground homes. They were only small rooms and were lived in up until 1988. Did you know Coober Pedy is the opal capital of the world ?

After that we spent some time walking the main street looking in many opal shops – there was plenty of jewellery. We had lunch at John’s Pizza (Uncle Simon would love this place). I had some wedges with sweet chilli sauce. James, Mum and Dad had pizza.

We had a restful afternoon playing games.

BIG ULURU

 
 
 
 

On the way to Ayers Rock we saw another big rock called Mount Connor. I wondered why it was called Mount Connor – I will have to look it up sometime, because I still don’t know!

On to Yulara (the town where Uluru is). When we got there, we were put on a site with no power, but Daddy sweet talked the lady into giving us a powered site. Then we set up and put on our sunscreen and hat in order to go and climb Ayres Rock.

The drive to the Rock is about 17 km and we had to pay to enter the park. We parked at the bottom of the Rock and started to walk up. I was a bit scared because I didn’t want to hurt myself. The first bit of the climb was very steep – about 30 metres with just rocks on the side to cling to, and then another 30 metres of very steep, slippery rock without any chains. That’s where I slipped and cried!

Mum climbed up first and then waited for each of us to get to the beginning of the chains. The chains were quite low, even for me! I was still scared, so Mum suggested that we go 10 chains at a time and then have a rest. We did that for a while and got up about ¾ of the way. We didn’t go all the way in case one of us got hurt.

It was a long way down… it was much easier going down as we turned around backwards and used our arms on the chains. We saw lots of people struggling with the climb, especially older people. Thirty five people have died on the Rock and our Prado friend Barb, broke her wrist and is having it operated on today to have a plate and screws put in!

We spent some time in the afternoon walking around the cultural centre looking for gifts and souvenirs. An ice block was a cool treat after a big day.

DAY 2:
We had a quiet day and planned what to do on our extra day. We had brunch with our Prado friends and then in the afternoon we had a big photo taken with all the Prado people and then another photo of just the cars in a row.

That evening we had dinner at a restaurant, named the Outback Pioneer. The kids had chips, nuggets and pizza. For dessert we had an icy pole. Then we went outside and played with our friends for the last time  .

DAY 3:
In the morning we went to the Olgas. From a distance they look like balls, but up close they are big smooth rocks. We went on the Walpa Gorge self guided tour and hear lots of birds calling to each other – their noise echoed in the gorge. There was a little creek which we got to touch – it was freezing. There are some animals living in the gorge because we saw Kangaroo poo.

We went back to the van for a quick lunch and then Mum and I went back to the Cultural centre to do Dot Painting.

An Aboriginal lady had an interpreter. An interpreter is someone who explains what people are saying who speak a different language. They sat down on the ground and smoothed out the sand. The lady didn’t have any shoes. She showed us some symbols and told us the stories of what they meant. The interpreted told us what she said and we then could ask questions.

After this, we were given a piece of canvas and we started to dot paint. I did my background red, but when I finished my first one I accidently dropped it in the sand. My second attempt rolled up because I painted on the wrong side of the canvas, but my third was great. I painted a snake in white and black dots and gave the snake gold and brown stripes. On either side of the snake I painted a water hole. In the sky I painted a sun and a bush and grass on the ground. I enjoyed this experience as it was fun to paint with Mum and learn from the Aboriginal lady.

Kings Canyon

 
 
 

In the morning we went in the first group of 5 cars to travel to Kings Canyon from Glen Helen. Our first stop was Gosse Bluff where a crater was formed when a meteorite hit the earth 142 million years ago. It was a big crater.

Then we continued our journey to Kings Canyon. It was a bumpy ride because it was a 4wd track. When we were still 45 minutes from our destination, Mum and I really needed to go to the toilet. We managed to hold on and we made it !!! Once we had setup the caravan, we sat outside and worked out what we would do today. We decided we would go out to Kings Canyon and do the big, big, big rim walk.

At first, we climbed a steep section and we were puffing and puffing. Finally, we stopped at a bit that had benches and we could put our bag which had our drink bottles down and we had a drink. On the walk we saw pretty rocks and ochre which was orange, white and yellow.

It was a long walk – 6.5km in total, but we did it in 2 hours!!!

At the end I decided to give my family awards. Dad got the Encourager Award because he encouraged me all the way, James got the Good Climber Award and Mum got the Helping in many Different Ways. James gave me a Perseverance Award and that made me very happy.

GLEN HELEN GORGE

 
 
 
 

After a quick trip we got to Glen Helen Gorge – we were the first of the Pradopoint group to arrive, so we set up our caravan and worked out which gorges we were going to visit.

First, we went to Big Ellery Creek Hole where we found a water hole. We wanted to go in for a swim, but it was a bit cold and a bit dirty.

We then decided to go to a place called ‘Standley Chasm’. We climbed over big boulders and under trees. It was hard work and very steep. Coming down was much harder than going up! I really liked walking through the Chasm because there were rocks around me on each side. Lots of people encouraged me to keep going because they could see that I was only little.

We then went to the Ochre pits – I fell asleep in the car after such a bog climb, so James and Dad ran down to the pit and took a photo. They use Ochre to make face paint. The boys said that the rocks were very colourful.

I woke up and we travelled to Ormiston Gorge. It had a water hole, but we didn’t see any animals around. We climbed up a few rocks (James loves to climb) and then got in the car to go back home.

We had dinner at the lodge – sausages, salad and bread. We went back to the van and had some white chocolate for dessert – Mum is very sorry she introduced us to the chocolate she likes!

WEST MACDONNELL RANGES CARAVAN PARK

 
 

Today we travelled to a great caravan park- it had a huge jumping pillow and a small one next to it. We had lots of jumping time today which was good fun. You can hire bikes and buggies to move around the park and each night they have some entertainment. The toilets and showers are the biggest we’ve seen yet!

Mum did three loads of washing – all our sheets, towels and clothes and Dad fixed the van and car (he put corflute on the back of the car window to stop the stones from breaking the window) ready for the next few days, we spent our time doing more jumping on the pillows and playing on the equipment.

At night we went to Desert Park on a Nocturnal visit. We got there at 7 p.m. and were given head lamps to wear. The light was red so that it doesn’t scare the animals. Other colours on the head lamp were white and disco!! I liked seeing the Bilbies, Echidnas, Mala and other animals. To enter the area we had to carefully walk though an electric fence – we had to be careful not to touch it. Our Guide, Pamela, was very interesting and knew a lot of information about the animals, what they ate and how they lived. We saw lots of their burrows and nests. In the middle was a water hole where we found a lot of the animals as they come there to drink at night – they were so cute

There was a huge full moon and was saw satellites going across the sky. There are so many more stars to see out here – it is beautiful.

ROSS RIVER

 
 
 
 

DAY 1:
On the way to Ross River we went to the Devil’s Marbles. We climbed up really high and I was a bit scared! They are so huge and quite smooth. There are lots of them to see – a few hundred! We loved climbing over them.

Our next stop was Ti Tree where we played in the park – it had a very high slide which was a bit scary, so I made James go first! He survived, so then I went down.

We finally made it to Ross River where we set up our caravan next to some of the other Pradopoint people and had dinner. We haven’t played with other children in three weeks – there are none to be seen in the caravan parks – only lots of older people so we are looking forward to seeing some other children soon.

DAY 2:
Today a lot of people arrived in their Prados – some have trailers and some just sleep in swags – I am thankful for my comfortable mattress. There is only one other caravan here. Finally, some children to play with. Some of the children we are playing with are named Brittany, Jessica, Samantha, Hannah and Hayley. We help Mav and his wife Dale set up the red, white and blue decorations as we are helping the two American men celebrate the 4th July. We had a Sausage sizzle and Hamburgers for dinner plus some fizzy drink. We got to play while the adults talked, but unfortunately I got a splinter in my hand which hurt. As part of the event we were all given a beanie to wear with the Pradopoint emblem on it. Mum and Dad also got a black and orange t-shirt with the same emblem. Some of the people got some camp fires going – the biggest one had huge logs so they poured diesel over the logs to get it going!


DAY 3:
We set off early with a long day of 4wd ahead. As there are 30 Prado cars, we split into 3 groups to travel. We were in group C and our leader was Sean. We were the second car in line. We tuned our UHF radio to channel 18 and off we went. Sean took us to some interesting sites so that we could have a walk around and a toilet stop before heading into Ruby Gap.

After a few tourist sites we started into Ruby Gap. It was pretty rough driving and no toilets to be seen (nothing like squatting in the dirt – I wasn’t too happy about that and was quite embarressed). The driving was great because we went over big rocks and through sand and dry river beds. There are 43 speed humps over the kilometres we travelled so we had to keep the speed down ( Sean asked us to count them along the way – that’s about the only maths we’ve done while we have been travelling – sorry Mrs Willis and Mrs Robinson).

Once we got to Ruby Gap we started looking for ‘rubies’ which are really only garnets. Two fossickers came to Ruby Gap a long time ago and thought they had struck it rich. They travelled back to Alice Springs to show everyone their riches but were so disappointed that one of them even killed themselves!

We collected lots of garnets and then went for a walk though the gap. It was beautiful! I have collected lots of rocks along the way – especially to give my friends at school.

We returned home and had some toasted sandwiches for dinner and then sat around the fire until about 9:30. We toasted marshmallows and listened to stories that our new friends told. Mum says we can buy some biscuits and chocolate so we can make S’mores for the next campfire!

TENNANT CREEK

 
 
 

DAY 1:
Tennant Creek was where we were headed today but unfortunately we broke down and the NRMA had to come and help us. He towed us to a Toyota dealer where we got an ice cream – a splice, while Dad and Brian the tow truck man talked to the Toyota dealer to see what was wrong with the car. They thought it would take a week to fix it because they thought the fuel pump had broken. It was only a petrol problem and after we filled up we were on our way. I was a bit scared being stuck out in the middle of the outback, but we played eye spy and I felt better. Some of the things we spied were: Spinifex, sky, cars (very few) and termite mounds!

We arrived at our caravan park and ordered pizza which was delivered to the caravan park! We also bought a fizzy drink to have with it. At night we sat outside and watched the beautiful fireworks. I had never seen fireworks like that before! We went to bed late (but I went to bed a bit later that James because I could see the fireworks out of my window!!

DAY2:
This morning we went and bought a new Gerri can to help us store fuel in case we run out again. Mum was a bit scared sitting in the car with us so she locked the doors while Dad went inside! There are a lot of Aboriginal people here – they didn’t have many clothes and most did not wear shoes. We saw young children pushing babies in prams and lots of dogs with them. They like to sit in big groups on the ground and chat together.

After our quick trip to get the Gerri can, we went to the Battery Hill Mine where we met our guide – Ray. It was so cool. We got to wear ear muffs and a hard hat so that if a wall fell in we would be O.K. We were able to carry big torches too. The best thing I liked in the mine was touching all the machinery – especially when Ray turned it on and we got to use it. He was interesting and told us many stories of when he worked in the mine. He was funny!

When we left the mine, we panned for gold but didn’t get anything. Ray told us where to find the gold and we started noodling and found heaps. He showed us a car park where they had dumped a lot of the gold so we went and washed it off and found lots of little pieces.

We had a swim in the afternoon – a bit chilly, but we had fun anyway. I wonder why no one else came in?

Mount Isa

 
 
 
 

Today we went to the Underground Hospital. It was very dirty and dusty. It was build in case the Japanese bombed Mount Isa because of the mines. The man gave us a quick tour before we went underground. He weighed us on a very old weighing machine. Inside the hospital we saw bed pans for people to go to the toilet in, beds for new born babies, beds with a straw mattress, old glass bottles, a bed for people who had injured their backs (it could rotate). We even saw some children’s play toys which were tiny soldiers made from wood which the children would bowl over with a marble.

The passage way was narrow to walk through and was forked into two passages – one lot of beds for men and the other beds for women. I was trying to imagine what it would be like to sleep on a bed of straw and on a wire frame. I am thankful for my bed!

After that we went to a park which had a man-made lake in the middle of it. We saw lots of different animals – eagles, kookaburras and peacocks. We had some lunch there and also played with the vortex and the football. We really enjoyed watching the eagles swoop and soar in the air around their nest. James taught me how to kick the football - I'm getting better!

On the way home we found a Cold Rock ice cream shop, so Mum and Dad bought us one each. I had Vanilla icecream with a crunchie mashed up into it. It was yum!

Wonderful Winton

 
 
 

Melanie Hall is a poet who tours around Australia – she is wonderful! For the two nights that we were at Winton, we went and watched Melanie perform. I was in two plays – the first night I was dressed up as the boy from the Bush Christening and got wet by her drink bottle as she ‘Christened’ me.

On the second night I was a red back spider and bit Dad (who was a sheila) on the bottom !!!

Banjo Patterson wrote “Waltzing Matilda” in the Winton area and there is a statue of him in the main street as well as monuments about the actual song.

The musical fence was interesting as you could grab a stick, a hose or a piece of pipe to bang on the fence wire. The sound boxes above the fence made the sound louder.

Dad found a green tree frog in the power connection box and he was cute. Dad wanted to name him Fredrick or Fredo, but I chose Fred. I wanted to bring him home as a pet, but Mum and Dad didn’t think this was a good idea, so he stayed in Winton. On the day we packed up, he was no longer in the power connection box. James and I looked everywhere for him, but we couldn’t find him anywhere.

There was a crazy man named Arno who had made a crazy wall out of junk !!! We had quick look at it, but couldn’t quite work out why it was on the “must see” list of things to do in Winton.

We had a great time in Winton and have just arrived in Mount Isa for a bit of a rest before we travel to the Northern Territory (Tennant Creek).

The Stockman's Hall of Fame

 
 

So far we have been looking at everything BIG but today we have been looking at things that are so OLD! First, we saw a cart that sold things to people living in the outback. Outback people had animals such as cows, horses, sheep, camels and much, much more.

They lived in house made of wood (not quite like the three little pigs) which had hard chairs, an open fire place for cooking their food, hard wooden beds which had no mattress, some glass bottles and it was very dirty and dusty. I don’t think I would like to live in it at all. It makes me thank God for all that I have.

I saw lots of maps – my favourite was one where you could push a button and it would light up where the explorer went throughout Australia. It was COOL!

Life was hard because they had to work on the land from when the sun came up, until the sun went down. They had problems with mice, locusts, drought, floods and rabbits.

I liked this place a lot.