Day 56
Batchelor - Pine Creek - Mataranka
"I've gone a bit country since I met you, baby, I used to be so rock n roll...."
Ahhh Mataranka and your thermal pools!
The kids have been hanging for today - why - because we get to go to Mataranka for a couple of nights. That means lying about in the 32 degree thermal pools for most of the day and live bands at night at the homestead!
We left Batchelor about 7.45 ready for our drive South. We stopped at Pine Creek along the way. It's the last remaining Gold Town this far north and still retains much of the history of its former years. The kids wandered about a park full of bird life whilst I threw in the jerry can to ensure we made Katherine.
Rolling on, we fueled and shopped again at Katherine - which still had yelling Aboriginies, even at a different time of day - and got outta there as quickly as possible!
Jesus loves Nachos!
So says the graffiti as you roll over the bridge into Katherine, and so when it came to working out what we'd have for dinner tonight - well if it's good enough for him..... I wonder if he liked sour cream and guacamole too ?? Anyway at Cobey's insistence, nachos it is!
We rolled into the Mataranka Homestead just before 2pm and quickly set up, had a late lunch and hit the thermal pool. Ahhhhh.
3 hours later... We dragged ourselves out to get ready for a heavenly dinner and a few cold beers.
Nachos over, we strolled across to the Homestead where The Giants are playing a few nights. They are are on a world tour... which of course includes Mataranka (as well as Madison Square Garden and Wembley Stadium I presume?).
The Giants are a Rock n Roll Blues band and their Lead Guitarist was Aussie Crawls lead - no wonder when they cranked out Reckless the guitar solo sounded so authentic!
We all loved sitting in the open with a roaring fire going and listening to live music on the stage, under a million stars in the middle of the outback! Let's do it all again tomorrow .... Just like groundhog day!