Darwin to Uluru

 We've really been having a good time since the last time I wrote on the blog. But, after looking through my camera I've realised I've been really slack at taking photos. And now there are some massive gaps in our travels, so I'll have to pull out some Pulitzer descriptive writing to compensate...
 So far, I have dispensed with the PhD, a very unresponsive supervisor and a lack of funding have made that a waste of 6 months, also we've decided to settle in Darwin. We love that city, and it doesn't make sense to live anywhere else.

 So, after living on the sunshine coast for a while, (not a bad area, but a bit too busy, and with lousy surf). We headed back up to Darwin, where I worked for a while, and did all the usual stuff. Which was great.
 Then we headed on a road trip down the centre, through Douglas Daly hot springs, Mataranka hot springs, Edith falls, Litchfield national park, the Devils Marbles, Kings Canyon and Uluru.
 I really wanted to go back to the Flinders ranges and climb st Mary's peak and see the area after some rain, but we ran out of time...

 Hyso with a fresh caught mud crab

Banded Sea Krait swimming around in the mangroves 

I'm not sure whether this is a type of banded sea krait, but I'm pretty sure. I think it was a bit lost in the shallow water

 

Mindil Beach Sunset - Darwin showing off

 

Mud Crab Round up - There were too many crabs, and a bunch of them escaped. We ended up giving a few to some nearby Aboriginal women, they were stoked

 Walking the mudflats

Mud Crab

 Cooberpedie - A really weird town, its pretty cool, most of the buildings are underground, its a bit depressed though, not much going on..

 Kings Canyon - Absolutely stunning landscape

 Kings Canyon

 Cliff jumping at Darwin

 Uluru at Sunrise - We got up at about 5:30 in the morning to get out to Uluru before the sunrise. Except when we got there it was completely overcast, we couldn't even see the sunrise...

 Mudcrab Cook Up - There was a big mob of Aboriginal people, these ladies were cooking a huge pot of pippies. They were pretty happy to throw some crabs on the fire too

 Banded Sea Krait from above

Beach Stone Curlews - You might have to click on this photo to see them properly. I've never seen them before, but they are just an even cooler version of stone curlews who come out during the day. I really like Curlews, they are very cool birds

Doglas Daly Hot Springs - One of my favourite stops in the Northern Territory. I took this photo in the morning when the mist off the river is best, but my camera died on the first shot, just after squeezing this off the wind whipped the steam up into two steam whirlwinds which looked really cool. I gotta get a new camera one day

Golden Trevally - I went spearfishing with a few guys off Moreton Island while on the Sunshine Coast, we didn't get any great fish, it was pretty murky, but one guy got the big Trevally which was pretty cool.

 

Devils Marbles - I took this photo off some website, my camera was dead when we headed through the Devils Marbles, but it was a really nice spot to stop, a Dingo (3/4 Dingo 1/4 Dog really) came into the camp as well which was cool

That's everything that was in my camera. In the future I might be heading to Tamworth, or to the Torres Straight Islands until a job opens up in Darwin. Time will tell.

 As far as the Lemon is concerned, we drove the old girl down from Brisbane recently, and while we were driving at night with the headlights on the volt meter was dropping really fast. So I assumed the alternator must finally be cactus (I've wanted to replace it for ages) so we drove down to the Blue Mountains during the day (and relied on the solar panels for power), then we got down and I went to take the alternator out to get a new one, and found out the alternator belt had loosened off somehow... It would have been good to know that earlier..

 Anyway, we are stationary for a bit, so I'm getting to do all the jobs I've wanted to do on the Lemon. We've emptied it out and repacked everything, and tomorrow I'm finally going to get on top of some rust which has been developing. I've also finally fixed the mystery oil leak, it was a small leak in the oil pressure switch, it was a nice easy fix for a change