Emerald 10th MayWe arrived here at about 5pm and the caravan park was full so for the first time we spent the night on a 20 hour free camping spot.In Emerald this is at the botanical gardens which sounds better than it is because it is between a railway bridge and major road bridge.You have to have your own power back up and water which we have so we were all right but we felt reluctant to leave the van in such an exposed place and of course we had to move off th...

Mount Isa Sunday 4th MayAn uneventful, boring journey except we saw dingoes.We thought dingoes were only found in certain places like Fraser Island but this was on the main highway on the way to Mt Isa.One was lying by the side of the road presumably road kill and the other was by it's side then it ran across the road.We came through Mt Isa and booked for two nights because we needed to shop and do the big wash when we change the bedclothes.We have done the washi...

Darwin Tuesday.First stop today was the oil storage tunnels.When Darwin was bombed by the Japanese in WW11 the oil storage tanks were badly hit and the authorities realised how vulnerable the oil supplies were so they built tunnels into the cliffs by the wharfs and the idea was to pump the oil from the wharf into the tunnels. (The tunnels themselves would have been the storage tanks) but by the time they had finished them the war was nearly over and the danger ha...

Darwin Sunday.We went to an independent church for the morning service which began at 10 and at 11.45 when we sneaked out they still had to have communion, ministry and a meal together.It was good to see so many young people but the music was a bit too hectic for us.The message was good and it is obviously a growing church.After lunch we went to the NT museum and art gallery specifically to see the exhibition about cyclone Tracy which devastated 70% of Darwin o...

Dinner cruise on Darwin Harbour.We were really looking forward to this our first chance to dress up for nearly 12 weeks.We put on our best clothes (after 12 weeks in a caravan these are the ones with the least stains) and Joe even cleaned his trainers.As we walked along the jetty we saw a beautiful boat with tables set with the finest crisp white linen, silver cutlery and sparkling glasses and we really became excited then a voice shouted 'Harrisons next boat dow...