We have spent the past few days in Kununurra, a small town in the north-east of Western Australia. We were here before we went off to the Bungle Bungles and always planned to return for a day or two, but our time here has just gone on and on and on, thanks to the camera saga.

While in the Bungles, Katy noticed a problem with the camera - see that blog for details. We found a camera shop in Kununurra and a helpful and seemingly knowledgeable assistant there said that it could be a battery problem. She suggested we give it a really thorough charging for at least 24 hours.

The saga began properly when we noticed some waterproof cameras on display. We haven't got a back-up of any kind and Katy pointed out that a waterproof would have its own advantages, as well as serving as a reserve. I concurred, but we both felt that the price at AU$419 was too much. Katy dug around on the internet and found that we could get the same camera for half the price. Great! Or was it?

We phoned the company concerned, Electronic Bazaar on Monday. Yes, they had the camera in stock, it would take 3 working days to deliver and would we like green, blue, pink or black? We chose green and then went through the rigmarole of paying for something on the internet in a foreign country. The girl on the other end said it was easier via PayPal than with a credit card, so we went with that, giving the local Post Office as our delivery address. Easy? No.

By Tuesday, the email we had been told to expect "within an hour" of our order being processed still hadn't been received. We phoned and were told there was a problem because our PayPal account is linked to our UK address, which is the only place the company could therefore send the camera. b*****.

The guy at Electronic Bazaar said he could send it to us in Kununarra, rather than Higham on the Hill, if Katy provided extra proof of her identity. This would get round the requirement to despatch only to the linked address. "I can send it our first thing tomorrow," he said. Hooray!

No confirmation email was forthcoming on Wednesday, nor would the guy respond to our phone calls. By Thursday we were getting angry and eventually got hold of him. Unless it was already on its way, we knew there was no way it was going to get to us until about Tuesday of the following week. He assured us that it had been sent from the warehouse and he was just awaiting a Post Office tracking number so we could trace its progress. We grit our teeth and waited.

On Friday, Electronic Bazaar rang to tell us that the green camera was out of stock and would we like another colour. b******s! All this time, they had done nothing with our order. It took them five days to discover that they didn't have the right colour, and in that time they told us a series of lies about our order. Not surprisingly, we cancelled our order. May they rot in a cesspit of their own filth until time ceases!

Oh and the camera, having had first a 24-hour charge and then a 48-hour charge appears to be - touch wood - fine at the moment. We shall see how it copes over the next few days as physically it will take a bit of a battering because we are about to head off on the Gibb River Road. This is a few hundred km of rough, corrugated dirt road between Kununurra and Derby. We will get shaken half to pieces in the process, and will have to hope that the camera's problem isn't related to physical abuse.

We will also have to hope that Ramsey stands up to the task ahead. When we were doing the Bungle Bungle dirt roads, he developed a new metallic rattle over the corrugations. (He's always rattled a bit, but this was different.) We were having a look under the bonnet and around the nearside wing, which appeared to be the source area, when the man in the next tent came over to see if we were having a problem.

I immediately adopted by 'Dumb Pom' persona, which isn't hard to do when it comes to anything mechanical, and Katy was wearing her little pink shorts, which always seem to help in these situations. One possible cause was the plastic grille at the front, which had broken away from a fixing in one place and would certainly be making a noise. Our neighbour produced some plastic snap ties and made the grille more secure.

He also noticed that the metal arm which goes across the battery to hold it in position was jutting up at an alarming angle. This was in fact the more likely culprit behind the new rattle as it was probably banging on the bonnet. We dug around and found some clothesline in the boot which we used to achieve a better fixing.

Ramsey is therefore being held together by a couple of bits of plastic AND Katy gave him a bit of a wash, but at least there was no waxing involved so I'm hopeful he'll be ok for the Gibb!.

We haven't really done much in Kununurra apart from get annoyed with dodgy online retailers. We did spend a couple of hours in the national park on the edge of town, wandering round a couple of Bungle-like formations. Having seen the real thing, their limited attraction was reduced to virtually nothing.

The best thing we have seen here, however, has been the bats. We were just sitting in our campsite at dusk one evening when we noticed some bats flying silently overhead. More came, then more and more until it looked like World War II footage of an air raid over London. I counted for 2-3 minutes and estimated there must have been a couple of thousand in that time. Then we noticed that the stream of bats extended far to both sides of us - because it was dusk we couldn't really see how far. However, a fellow camper told us a couple of nights later that she had been on a trip on Lake Argyle when the bats took off nearby and the guide had said that there were at least one million and more like two million. That's a lot of bats.

Katy has been happy with the weather, which has been about the hottest we have had so far in Australia. We've now been in the country since May 12 and haven't experienced a drop of rain since May 28th at the latest. In that time, we have barely had 2-3 days which you could describe as cloudy.

To change the subject completely, you know how those in their middle or later years complain about the way young people talk constantly on their mobiles and have no consideration for those around them? Well, over here the boot is well and truly on the other foot. On several occasions recently, we have noticed middle-aged, or even wrinkly, people sat talking on their mobiles for hours at a time.

There is also a pattern - a very annoying pattern if you are anywhere within hearing range. Part of the problem is that the range is much bigger than you think. People no longer in the first flush of youth tend to hear less well and therefore talk more loudly - which is not usually much fun for those around them. And this is made a hundred times worse by two more factors.

Firstly, the conversations tend to be of stupefying banality. "Yes, the weather's lovely… Bert's having a nap at the moment... We're having chops for dinner… There are lots of caravans in this caravan park… Is the cat alright?" If it has been listening to this rubbish then no, the cat is not alright and has probably just thrown itself in the jaws of the neighbours' Doberman in a bid to end it all!

And secondly, this same conversation is then repeated - word for bloody word and at the same excessive volume - to someone else 'back home'. The next time I am subject to this extreme form of mental torture, I will look for the nearest Doberman and beg for a swift end.

Richard

PS Katy said I'm middle-aged and going deaf, but I just pretended not to hear her…