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Day 24 - Renner Springs to Mount Isa - 809km

When we woke this morning it was to very different weather conditions than the previous day's hot and humid 35 degrees. It was very overcast and threatening to rain when we left Renner Springs and before we got too far down the road it started to bucket down. Rained so hard at times it was difficult to see the road ahead and our wet weather gear couldn't cope either so we were saturated.

We reached Three Ways in the pouring rain so just made a quick fuel stop and turned left onto the Barkly Highway. Weather was too lousy to bother with a 60km detour to have a look at Tenant Creek...we'll see that on the next trip!

Eventually after about 200km we escaped the rain and stopped at Barkly Homestead for fuel and brunch. However they took so long with the food when we left the rain had caught up again and we had to drive through heavy rain for about another 100km again. Eventually we got away from it and were able to make better time heading east towards Queensland.

After travelling 250km from Barkly Homestead we reached the border....and hooray we are back in Queensland..well at least I think that's a good thing. Downside is that the speed limit now drops back to 110km/h thanks to some dopey bureaucrat who has probably never even driven on the roads out here.

Just down the road from the border crossing we stopped for fuel at Camooweal where we spotted this sign outside the servo.

After a quick fuel stop it was continue on to Mount Isa. Along the way encountered this tanker road train which used to be white before it drove down a red dirt road!!!

200km of relatively boring road later arrived in Mount Isa and except for the mine in the middle of town there's not too much to tell about it either, except it is now back to more realistic prices for beers again!!

This little fella was waiting at the entrance to the laundry to say hello.

Day 23 - Jabiru to Renner Springs - 847km

We woke to no electricity this morning due to maintenance work so couldn't even have a coffee to start the day. As we were leaving we came across these two dingoes, just around the corner from the caravan park.

Bit hard to show in photos here but as we headed out on the Kakadu Highway we started to see some of the countryside you would expect such as these billabongs right beside the roads - no sign of any crocodiles though.

Scattered everywhere were these large termite mounds apparently known as magnetic termites, which is to do with the way they build them in relation to the sun to keep them cool.

This gives a better idea of the size of the termite mounds...and this was not the biggest one we saw.

Of course have to show the straight road shot..

You might need to enlarge the below photo to read the sign....it is the town of Mataranka which apparently is the gateway to Never Never...so now we have been to the Middle of Nowhere and the Never Never!!

Not too sure what this is meant to show....lucky it's out of focus I guess!!

**pic deleted**

Once we left Kakadu National Park and turned back onto the Stuart Highway at Pine Creek (100km north of Katherine), there really wasn't much to see except the usual straight roads and bushland. Eventually we arrived at a little place called Renner Springs Desert Inn which would be our stop for the night. It is a roadhouse just up the road from Nowhere. There was even a welcoming party outside the bar for us.

Inside was a typical country bar where people right stuff all over the walls and in this place they also have a cap collection which is considerably larger than mine. The manager says they have been collecting them  since the beginning of time and estimate there are more 2000 caps hanging in the bar.

Here we also caught up again with a group of 4 bike riders from Rockhampton who have been doing a similar trip to us. We have passed them numerous times on the road since Broome and we finally ended up staying at the same place tonight.

Day 22 - Darwin to Jabiru - 297km

This morning we left Darwin and headed for Kakadu National Park. On the way we tried to stop in at Hidden Valley Raceway to get a photo however as the Australian Superbike Championship Round was on this proved a little difficult. After leaving town of course we had to travel a couple of straight roads again.

200 kilometres from Darwin we reached the entrance to Kakadu National Park - another one ticked on the bucket list!!

We continued to Jabiru Lodge where we had accommodation booked for the night. We decided to visit the local bakery for lunch before heading out to the airport for the scenic flight. This chap below was hanging around outside the bakery looking for a friend to feed him.

After lunch it was out to the airport and below is our ride for the trip out to the Kakadu wetlands, the escarpment and Arnhem Land- a Robinson R44 helicopter.

Not too sure how they get away with leaving the doors off given the current OHS laws in this country however it certainly helped with a clear view of the countryside.

Not really sure if what we saw is what my expectations of Kakadu and Arnhem Land were, however it was still stunning and I guess it is nearly the end of the wet season so there wasn't too much water around now. As the old saying goes..."a picture is worth a thousand words".....well we took a thousand photos today so how many words is that to describe it? And i don't think any of them really do it justice but here is just a few samples....all i can say is if you ever get the chance to do this then jump at it...it is an amazing sight from the air!

If anyone wants to see more then let me know, as I said earlier, we have another 1000 photos just like these!

Day 21 - Darwin - 0km

Well, we decided that today was going to be a rest day and it turned out to be the first day since leaving home that we didn't get on the bike at all. We had found reasonable accommodation on the edge of the city so we spent most of the day walking around town sightseeing. We visited the Tourist Information Centre and booked a helicopter flight over Kakadu for tomorrow afternoon which leaves from Jabiru out in the centre of Kakadu National Park. We will travel out there in the morning and stay Saturday night there.

Amazing what you can do just walking down the mall in Darwin...for a $5 "donation" you can handle these snakes and take as many pictures as you like. Although as they were still alive and moving they were not my preferred species so I graciously declined the offer. Kerrie however was a little braver and had a chat to this Olive Python which was about 20kg and 3m long.

After visiting nearly every souvenir shop in town we went into Crocosaurus Cove in the heart of the city to have a look at the crocodiles in there. 

We were able to get up close and personal with some of the juvenile crocodiles as well as feeding some of them.

Just an example of one that didn't get away!!!

Finished off the visit with the official tourist photo holding an 11 month old crocodile.

We have now travelled 13,000km over 3 weeks, and still have a long way to go to get home. Generally the weather has been kind to us but I'm sure that will change by the time we get across to Cairns and head down the Queensland Coast.

Day 20 - Kununurra to Darwin - 869km

Heading out from Kununurra, it wasn't long before we reached the WA/NT border and completed another tick on the bucket list...we have now ridden a Goldwing through every State and Territory in Australia.

Even better now that we are in the NT the speed limit is a bit more realistic, although gone are the days of the old unlimited speeds up here. Although the other noticeable thing is that as soon as we crossed the border the quality of the road has deteriorated somewhat. Seems a bit crazy really that all through SA and WA the highway has been fantastic but only a maximum speed of 110 and now we can go 130 the road is   not as good. Also took some getting used to not backing off the throttle at that speed when it may have been a police car coming from the opposite direction.

The scenery wasn't as good as the previous days's ride either and to make it worse there quite a lot of small grass fires burning right beside the road. At one point had to come to a stop as we couldn't see through the smoke but fortunately after a couple of minutes a truck came from the opposite direction and his draft cleared the smoke enough that we could see enough to drive through and it wasn't really as bad as it looked. Wherever the fires were there was also lots of hawks circling and diving, i think to try and catch the small creatures that the fire was driving out of the bush.

Came across a few of these on the roads too...don't know what they are called....birds I suppose.

Straight stretches weren't quite as long either and even had a few mountains and cliffs around to break things up a bit.

Grass fires continued to be a common site during the day.

It was along one of these stretches that one of the hawks we had seen a lot of decided he would try to dive bomb us....well he learnt the hard way that half a tonne of Goldwing travelling at 130km/h was too much for him to take on...although he did manage to break the lower cowling on impact.

After battling all the elements and arriving at Katherine about 2pm, we decided that we would push on another 300km up to Darwin. The humidity was increasing dramatically and we arrived in Darwin very hot, sweaty and tired after a long day on the bike which saw us ride 869km in far from ideal riding conditions. Needless to say the beers went down quite well tonight, and we can now say we have ridden a Goldwing to every State, Territory and Capital City in Australia.