Tepid Spring Park

Our German neighbours ended up not being so bad, so we were able to get about our business of doing fuck all. There was some nice wildlife around the watering hole, such as Mertens Water Monitor and the Azure Kingfisher, plus a shit load of Sulpher Crested Cockatoos.

What sort of stupid name is Merten?

We have taken a lot of wildlife photos, and if I get a chance I’ll post more of them on our Flickr site. We enjoyed our last day at Limmen, and decided the next day that we’d head for the edge of the park.

Tom's photography gets 10/10 for effort

We smashed the packing, and powered out of the site leaving the Germans still packing up…fucking amateurs. We quickly reached the campsite, but decided that the day was still young, the site was not that great and I had plenty of drive left in me. We highlighted a NP just outside of Mataranka, called Elsey NP. It had rave reviews and some hot springs. It was a fair old distance, and the drive I thought I had left in me quickly diminished; to be honest the 1200km of corrugated, rough roads were starting to get to me. However, we dug in, and made it to the lovely bitumen of the Stuart Highway.

It was getting late when we pulled into Elsey, and like the Dutch toddler, I was tired and very whiney. The site was odd, nicely laid out with good areas, but bollards everywhere that stopped you getting too close to the sites and sprinklers that were active everyday between 1-3pm. This is a real pain for our camping set up, but we managed to find a spot reasonably close to the car. However, we would have to make sure everything was away and out of sprinkler distance tomorrow afternoon. I was not a happy bunny. A few beers did little to improve my mood and I went to bed grumpy.

One thing we never do is learn anything from our mistakes. We decided that, despite realising that 7km was our limit for walks, to set off on an 8km walk to a waterfall, the name of which I don’t care to look up. As we were preparing for our walk, our neighbour came over for a chat. Becky noticed he had very yellow toenails. He showed us a great tip for stopping the sprinklers, by ramming a twig in the flapping system, and mentioned the location of a bowerbird nest. We were a little sceptical of his method, but thanked him anyway. A few moments later Mr Yellow Toenail’s wife came over. Her toenails were not discoloured. She mentioned a small, croc-free swimming hole (literally a hole 2m by 2m) in the creek that was perfect for an afternoon dip. We thanked her, and set off on our 8km walk. The walk to the waterfall was sandy, which made walking hard, particularly in my shitty trainers. We got to the waterfall, and it is exactly as you’d expect…a total waste of time.

Not worth the 8km round trip

Becky tried to convince me that it was good to stretch our legs after all the driving, but I was having none of it.

Even Becky's hilarious "I'm gonna jump" joke did little to lighten the mood

The walk back was worse, as the return route was the same track we’d already walked. Becky joked near the end about another waterfall near the campsite being better, but I had totally run out of fucks to give and didn’t even stop to look.

And only 500m from the campsite

When we got back to the site, Mr Yellow Toenail’s trick was working wonders and our tent and gear were dry and the sprinkler was shooting its jet of water into the bush! We decided to get on with sorting out our over packed car, a major task of our trip, but found doing this was quite sweaty in the heat and went for a dip in Mr Yellow Toenail’s wife’s suggested spot. It was great! A second great tip from Mr Yellow Toenail and his wife. We also looked at the bowerbird’s nest, and it was lovely… We love Mr Yellow Toenail and his wife.

Tom was so scared of crocodiles, he farted fish and sand!

Brave Becky didn't give a fuck

After the lovely and refreshing dip, we decided to visit the famous hot springs. It seems strange to have a hot springs that people want to visit in an area where the daytime winter temperature is in the low 30’s, but we were interested. It was an odd set up for a NP, as you first had to walk through a private campground, and, like Ikea, they directed you through their bar area, so you could see all the good times to be had. They were advertising the visit of whipcracking champion, Nathan Griggs on Sunday… I didn’t even know there was a championship in whipcracking, or that whipcracking was a thing.

Turns out Tina was wrong, we did need another hero

We wandered down to the hot springs to find a concreted pool area, filled with people of all ages enjoying the spring. It was horrendous. It just looked like a shitty pool, but without chlorine and other cleaning agents counteracting the skin and faecal matter that must be filling the water. I dipped in my toe to find the water temperature lukewarm, so not really a hot springs, more a tepid springs… It made us even more grateful to Mr Yellow Toenail’s wife for her top tip.

The perfect temperature for picking up infections and gastroenteritis

For dinner, Becky cooked up a lovely rice dish and we went to bed happy. Elsey NP had turned out to be all right, excluding the tepid spring. We packed up without fuss in the morning, and whilst walking to the shower I saw Mr Bowerbird doing a dance with some offering in his mouth. As I walked closer to take a look I scared the female away. The male did not look impressed…I just cock-blocked a bowerbird!

All that work for a bald dickhead to fuck it all up

Today we head for the bright lights of Katherine, and with a population just under 9000 it’s the biggest town we’ve been in since Cairns.