6th August

Travelling to Adelaide River we made a morning tea stop at Mayce's Cafe at Pine Creek for her famous Scones/Jam & Cream. Just scrumptious. I took over the driving from there, it was quite a good run to Adelaide River where we were staying in a caravan park behind the Pub and we backed onto the swimming pool, which was very nice. After settling down we visited the War Cemetery. During the second World War, Adelaide River was the headquarters of a large base and the Adelaide River Cemetery was created especially for the burial of servicemen and women who died in this part of Australia.

 

     

7th August to 10th August

After filling the tank and jerry can, we headed for Wangi Falls in the Litchfield National Park where we hoped to get a caravan site for 4 nights. We made a stop at Batchelor to obtain some groceries. Graeme spoke to the ranger who advised us to go straight to the Wangi Falls find a site and then go a pay . We were very lucky we were driving around and found a couple who were just finishing packing up. This is a very popular place and you can see why. We settled in had lunch and went for a swim in the Falls. The Wangi Falls, has two falls cascading into a cool, freshwater pool, it was just beautiful and certainly cooled us off. It was 36 degrees and climbing. Every morning and night we were honored byb the presents of mum Wallaby and her off spring.

 

8th August ......... Up around 8.00am had breakfast and decided to take a scenic walk 1.7km loop return walk, an interpretive walk, which commenced near the pool. The loop took us through rainforests and many rocky paths over the top of the falls. This took nearly 1 hour and we were certainly ready for coffee when we returned.

After lunch we drove to see the:

Magnetic Termite Moulds.......These moulds standing up to two metres in height, are in a north-south orientation. The configuration acts as a built-in-temperature mechanism, allowing only the  least  possible surface area to be exposed to the heat of the sun.

     

Buley Rockhole..........This is a series of small waterfalls and rock holes which provided a perfect site to cool off. I wadded in for a short time while Graeme took photos. If you were feeling energetic there was a track which lead from there to the Florence Falls, we weren't, it was too hot.

        

Florence Falls..........This was a double waterfall set amid monsoon rainforest, and don't we know that as we took the longer walk through the forest to the falls. There were many small streams and little bridges to cross to get to the falls. We had a swim and sat for a time just taking in the scenery even a tree snake that caused some disturbance particularly among the women. There were fish that swam around us and didn't worry about the human invasion. When we walked back we climbed 135 stairs which was the shorter way, but not half as nice. I

think we walked around 4.5 klms that day all up, which did us no harm.

Tolmer Falls viewing platform..........This was our last stop for the day as it was getting late and we were very tied and hot. One of the most spectacular falls, Tolmer Falls cascades over two high escarpments into a distant, deep plunge pool. There is no public access to the bottom of these falls as this is home to several colonies of the rare and protected bat species, Ghost Bats and Orange Horseshoe Bats. We headed home for a well earned rest , dinner and early bed, ready for tomorrow

                 

9th August......We decided to drive the 4WD track 10.5kms to the lost city, what an experience, I was glad to get there. This was a very impressive site reminiscent of the ruins of some long lost civilisation, it is a formation of sandstone blocks and majestic pillars formed and weathered by the elements. We spent some time walking around this wonderful sire taking photos and just being amazed of what was there.