Vacation in the top end!

Mindel Beach sunset

Hotel pool in Darwin

Well it was time for our first vacation so we decided to take advantage of the winter weather and drive north to the top end of Australia. Hard to imagine what the weather would be like in summer considering the temps were in the high 80's with high humidity everyday.

Fountains at outdoor mall

When we first arrived in Darwin I wanted to scream I was so excited, it was a city!!!! After being land locked in a small desert town it was great to see tall buildings and the ocean. While most of our stops on this trip we would be staying in cabins in a caravan park, here we were staying in a hotel with the ocean on one side and a busy street full of shops, bars and restaurants behind us. The first night we went to the Mindel markets at Mindel beach, this is an outdoor market with arts and crafts and about 30 food booths. We were able to take a walk on the beach and then enjoy the beautiful sunset. We were not the only ones enjoying the sunset though, there had to be a 1000 people on the beach that evening. Funny thing is they put out flags each day, they say you can swim between the flags and avoid the crocs, but they also tell you they catch a wild croc a day in the water- no thank you!

This flag meant no crocs!

Crocosaurus Cove was one of our many stops in Darwin, it was a mix of Aquarium and croc exhibits. There was even a pool where you could throw on your bathers and swim with the crocs with only plexi between you- no one on our family wanted to jump in! Dillon did want to hold a baby croc though, he even pretended to eat it for the picture. When I went to pet the croc he jerked his body so fast that he scared the hell out of me and Jake.

  On the way back towards Alice Springs we took the Spectacular Jumping Crocodile cruise on the Adelaide river. It was a 2 level boat with glass windows on the bottom and open on top. We saw about 15 wild crocs on the cruise, 2 of the largest males swam up to the boat for a chance at a rack of ribs. They hold it over the side and eventually the croc will jump out of the water to get it, very impressive! I could not help but think that they had managed to train an 80 year old wild croc to jump for the ribs yet I could not teach a rat terroir dog to stop running away from her only food source!

This is a replica of the largest crocodile they caught in the river

A jumping croc!

Cutta Cutta caves

Another stop was the Cutta Cutta caves, a national park tour through a group of limestone caves. The boys were impressed with the caves and were hoping to see the bats, but unfortunately we only got to see and smell the bat poo! The guide showed us limestone formations in the shape of a face, a dog with a bone, a kangaroo and then lastly one in the shape of Elvis, I guess it is true- Elvis is everywhere!

Through out the entire drive there were termite mounds everywhere, we saw some as large as 10 feet high and 4 feet in diameter. We stopped at a field of them to get this shot, I am not sure how there is any wood left here in the outback!

Termite mounds

Thermal pool

Mataranka was one of our favorite stops, right after we checked in we heard someone yell Combest family as we were walking to our car- it was our next door neighbors from Alice camping out, hard to believe you could drive a 1000k and run into someone you know. We had a wonderful evening hanging out at their campfire sharing a bottle of wine while the kids played flashlight tag. We stayed at the Mataranka Homestead which is right next to the Thermal springs, imagine a crystal clear, natural spring with water at a temp of 80-85 degrees, surrounded by palm trees- needless to say we had a great swim. All around our cabin we saw peacocks, kangaroos and wallabies. There was a restaurant where the food was actually pretty good and live music every night. Dillon actually wanted to stay here longer.

Right outside our cabin

We had to make a stop at Devil's Marbles National park, particularly since we have a pen and ink drawing of it in our family room. JD inherited four sketches when his dad passed away that were purchased in Alice Springs in 1972. There are enormous boulders after enormous boulders stacked on top of each other for as far as you can see, it makes no sense that they could remain that way for thousands of years. I wish we would of had more time here.

Devil's Marbles