Walkabout training

"Walkabout" (James Marshal) was the title of one of my favourite books, when I was about 12. It's also a great movie starring Jenny Agutter, so go read it or watch it. I won’t tell you the plot as that would spoil it, but suffice to say it's about surviving in the Australian outback. Today, we did the tourist version of Walkabout, which means we went about 7km in the intense heat between about 10 am and one pm. We had planned to be earlier, having got up at 6am, but poor maps and/ or our pathetic map reading skills meant that we wasted more than an hour finding the start of the walk after our 93km drive. Mind you, that drive was rather special with Kangaroos on, or beside the road, loads of birds, giant termite mounds, and rather strangely wild horses.
The walks in Queensland were pretty much idiot proof, but here in the Northern Territories, they like to keep you guessing. There are very small yellow arrows once every 15 minutes or so, but whoever designed them seems to not know that yellow is not so easy to spot in this landscape.
Despite that, we got to our destination, which is called motor car falls. The only place round here that does not have an aboriginal name. It’s because it was first reached by a car, a Chevrolet, about 50 years ago. Did I say it was hot? Well, the next day, I met people from Darwin complaining it was hot, so think how it feels if you come from sunny Dundee. It's 38C with 90% humidity if that means something to you.
The falls are really beautiful and we have them all to ourselves, just like the 93km road, there is not a single person we see or meet all morning. But better than the falls is the pool below. It has a diameter close to 50m, and the water is a perfect 27 or 28C. (I know all this from our pool thermometer and knowing how refreshing or not water is). We have been told it's crocodile free, which we might not have believed, but the water is clear, and so no crocs here.
So after an hour in the pools we are all fresh, and delighted to have such a wonderful place to ourselves. But, but, but….there is 3.5km to walk back, and it's just after midday. There is almost no shade on the walk, so the temperatures are way above 40C. Ooof! I make a makeshift Arab head covering with a bathing towel, and I think I win the prize for the best solution to the extreme heat.
Near the end of the walk, we bump into the 1st humans, two Australians in their late 20s, whose mother is from Cupar, Fife. That is where my mother, aunts, and several cousins went to school. My grandparents and aunt are buried there. So we talk about heat in Australia and lack of heat in Scotland.
The drive back is by comparison to the morning drive, rather unexciting because its even too hot now for the animals, but we are glad to have the aircon, and head back to the Glamcamp’s pool.
We end the day feasting on Kangaroo steaks and sausages. It's really rather tasty.

Note. Usually, Findpenguins.com gets the temperature more or less right, but of course, these are shade temperatures for places that often have no shade. On this day, I have literally no idea where the 21C comes from. It was a minimum of 35C in the shade!Read more