There is a 660km long red dirt road stretching across some of the remotest area in Australia. The road was carved out of the bush so remote cattle stations could transport their cows from absolutely in the middle of nowhere to......somewhere else only slightly less in the middle of nowhere. The road is only reliably open for, at best, 6 months of the year as the Wet season is very wet. Much of it is corrugated; there are some filthy rocky sections and there are lots of creek crossings. Corrugations are the undoing of many vehicles on dirt roads, the unrelating vibrations rattle your teeth and literally shake your vehicle to pieces underneath you. They are little bumps like waves in the road, regularly spaced about a foot apart. They build up over time as many vehicles pass by, each tyre pushing a little more dirt onto each pile. In late May, a month into the Dry, the temperatures are hot hitting 38 degrees. The 4WD only Gibb River Road is many off-roaders dream destination. Our guidebook calls it "one of Australia's wildest outback experiences." Actually we thought the road wasn't as bad as all that, the road was pretty flat and straight. However we did manage to shred a tyre and break 3 disc-brake covers! So maybe the truck didn't find it so easy after all. The road runs alongside some beautiful red rock escarpments filled with waterfalls running into gorges. Many of them have shady waterholes but this being Australia some of the most enticing spots are off limits due to crocs. Both freshies (freshwater crocodiles) and salties (saltwater crocodiles) can be found in the Kimberleys. Freshies are harmless unless provoked but the salties must be completely avoided. In the past couple of weeks we've read of two people being taken by salties in places we have been in the past 2 months, one near Darwin and one in the Daintree. There are very croc aware here, checking at the start of each season and relocating any. Big signs are erected warning people if there is any possibility of salties. However there were several gorges where we could have cooling swims underneath waterfalls. The other bonus was that although it was stinking hot it cooled down at night and there wasn't the draining humidity that tested our tempers in the Top End. Our first few nights we camped at El Questro and Home Valley, two stations that have found tourists more profitable than cows. Although very remote, at this time of the year it is very popular so the campsites were busy. El Questro has several amazing gorges, our favourite was Emma Gorge with its almost circular canyon around us. The waterfall plunged over the walls on one side while droplets constantly dripped off the ferns all around the sides. After the sweaty walk in we cooled off in the crystal clear waters, when the goosebumps started we swam to one side where warm mineral waters bubbled out from the rocks. Elsewhere on the more than a million acre property, we wallowed in shallow pools while warm spring waters trickled past. Surrounded by Pandanus palms it was a beautiful place to bird watch in the early morning. At Home Valley we decided to experience the Kimberleys from a new perspective, the girls and I on horseback and Steve by helicopter. Giant baramundi fish can be found in the rivers but the best spots are pretty inaccessible, so Steve decided to try his luck at heli-fishing. He loved the flight over the plains with the red sandstone escarpment in the distance. There are laws about the size of catch you can keep, only fish between 50-80cm can be taken. All baramundi start life as males but change sex when they get to a certain size. Steve was happy with his 5 catches but unfortunately they were too small to take. However one of the other fishermen caught a perfect sized one and he invited us all to share it in the restaurant that night. Alisha and I loved our ride to an old stockmen's camp in the early morning, as huge long-horned bulls watched us pass by. Thankfully our trusty steeds were very used to cattle and walking through creeks, so it was a relaxing ride. Lucy was too young to do the big ride but got a chance to do two shorter children's rides instead. Almost every night the girls and I would work on out latest project for school, picking out the constellations in the clear night skies. A few weeks ago back in Alice, I wrote in the blog about our worries about our deteriorating tyre conditions. After all the problems we had in South America; the 2 week wait we had in Punta Arenas in Chile; and the expense of getting new ones air freighted in, we made advanced tyre plans for Austalia. When we arrived 8 months ago we found out that there were very few of the Michelin tyres we need in the country. We found 6 and purchased them but left them at the warehouse. The thought was that at the end of our Australian loop we would have a complete exchange and be ready for our drive through Asia. Unfortunately for us the last bit of our loop is on some of the roughest roads. The tyres should be good for about 60,000km but 5000km short of that, in the middle of absolutely nowhere, the back left one completely shredded. We weren't driving fast and so it wasn't scary but we couldn't work out what the caused it to completely break up. We set to work in the searing afternoon heat, with no shade changing the 120kg tyre wasn't easy. Getting the spare tyre off of the mount on the back of the truck actually takes longer than changing the wheel. We've got it down to a fine art now and we were both remarkably good humoured about it all. We needed a few seconds help lifting the tyre mount down and back into place. Thankfully people stopped and asked if they could help, just at the right moments. Whatever technique we use the two of us can't lift it back on by ourselves. After 2 hot, sweaty, dusty hours we were done. That afternoon the girls got a lesson in staying healthy in the heat. While Steve and I were fine because we'd kept on downing water while we worked, they had chosen to watch a movie in the hottest part of the truck away from the open windows and fans and hadn't taken a drink. They felt rather peculiar and now understand why I am constantly nagging them to drink. They chirped up again once they had rehydrated. We found a delightful little clearing just for us about 500m down a track for our early night. The next three nights we stopped at three different gorges: Manning, Bell and Windjana. At Manning the walk started with a 30m swim across a clear still creek, there was a wobbly tinny (metal boat) on a rope but we slung the backpack in it and swam across the pushing the boat. Our wet swimming costumes kept us cool for the 3km walk in the middle of the afternoon, across the rocky, high country hike through spear grass that was taller than me. At the other end was a long gorge with a stunning waterfall at the end. It was a blissfully cool swim and shower under the falls before we turned homewards. At Bell Gorge we climbed down the gorge's steep walls to swim in the tranquil pools before the falls. All thoughts of swimming were out at Windjana, as it is considered one of the best places in Australia to see fresh water crocodiles. The limestone walls were laid down 380 million year ago in the Devonian Period by an ancient giant coral reef. A shift in the tectonic plates means that the fossilised reef is now hundreds of kilometres from the sea. It makes an impressive sight with it dark walls rising above the surrounding plains. As we hiked along its deep bottom, we tried to look out for fossilised marine remains. Failing badly, we looked out instead for the live ancestors of ancient beasts and were rewarded with the sight of lots of freshies just hanging out just below the surface. Even at that temperature, having a swim lost all of its appeal.   Having left the Gibb River Road it was on the short but horribly corrugated section of the road to Windjana that we discovered what had happened to our disc-brake covers. "Truckie" as he is often affectionally known, is a beautiful piece of precision German engineering. He is able to cope with almost whatever we put in his path - apart from low hanging trees. However he does have one tiny design flaw, the pieces of metal that cover the brakes and stop stones getting into them are incredibly weakly attached. The disc-break covers really have so little function that we've managed thousands of kilometres without them. The first sheared its three tiny attachment points in Panama, we had it re-welded and put back on. Since then we have broken disc-brake covers all over the four continents. They might be simple to weld back together but can cause quite a bit of damage as they break off. Truckie has his own distinctive rattle over any corrugations. "Don't worry about that horrible sound," we say "it's just the disc-brake covers wobbling." It's part of Steve's regular truck check to check they are still in one piece. On this particular nasty set of corrugations we heard the back driver's side cover go, we pulled over to investigate. Thankfully when fully sheared from its 3 bolts, the back wheel doesn't need to be removed to get the broken disc-brake cover off. Checking out the other covers we were surprised to find we had already completely lost the other back cover sometime in the previous 36 hours. We had heard a rattle, checked it out including me running beside the moving truck to investigate the sound, and had found nothing. It must have fallen off sometime after that. The front passenger side one was also found to have sheared one of its three fixed points. It was still attached enough to get to the campsite at Windjana Gorge where we had to remove the front wheel, as the front covers need you to remove the wheel to get it off. However, we waited till the cool of the following morning to attempt that sweaty job. Bats, frogs, fish and freshwater crocs all live in the stream that runs through Tunnel Creek. It was a scramble over the boulders that hide the cave entrance then we waded through the foot deep water. The whole cave runs for a kilometre or so but we gave up after a few hundred metres as our head-torches were no match for the all enveloping pitch black. It was also the thought of what might bump into our feet in the dark waters that got us skipping back quickly to the bright entrance of the cave. We loved our trip along the Gibb River Road. All those big skies, red escarpments and the sense of remoteness were a real delight. It wasn't quite the solitary experience we had expected as lot of other people on the road enjoying it too but it was beautiful.

We sat on the warm rocks overlooking the red escarpment. As the sun started to set the escarpment lit up in a series of oranges and reds. It was the perfect end to a wonderful few days in the Bungle Bungles, or now more correctly known as the Purnululu National Park. The National Park consists of a series of gorges or chasms and is most famous for its bungles a series of banded sandstone domes that some people describe as looking like Jaffa cakes. These unusual features were supposedly only discovered by the "white fella" in the 1980s as they are in quite a remote part of the Kimberley. Although the main highway goes relatively close by it's a rough 60km track across creek beds to get to the National Park. The park is world heritage listed for two main features - the areas incredible natural beauty and its outstanding geological value.  We had left Edith Falls the previous week and headed to Katherine Gorge where we had hoped that we would be able to go canoeing up the gorge. When we arrived though the water level in the river was still too high and they had not yet performed the checks for crocodiles so we had to content ourselves with a walk to admire the gorge instead. We headed west on a fairly long drive to the small town of Kunnunura. As we neared the town we crossed over the border into Western Australia where we had to turn the clocks back one and a half hours. This made no sense to us as it would now be getting dark at 5.30pm and then light again at 5.30am in the morning. So we decided to have our own time and just move the clocks back 30 minutes. It's not exactly as if we are doing much where we need to know the real time anyway. Although Kunnunura is only a small town it's the only town of any size for hundreds of kilometres so was a good base to stock up. One thing we needed to stock up with was beer. We had become used to the fact that alcohol was harder to buy in parts of the Northern Territories and Western Australia in order to curb alcohol problems in the local community but did not realise just how hard it was going to be. After finishing our shopping it was still too early to buy beer from the bottle store so we headed to the campground. As it was only a kilometre walk back to the bottle shop I headed back there that afternoon. When I went to pay I was asked whether was I in my car. When they found out I wasn't they politely said they could not sell it to me as they could only sell take away drinks to people in vehicles so I rather angrily returned to the campsite got in the truck and drove back to the bottle shop. Now confidently I returned to the counter with my beer. Having established I was in a vehicle they then asked me for identification. Now I know I still look pretty young but it must be 30 years since I have been asked for my ID when buying a drink. To be fair for some reason there were extra restrictions in force that day and each vehicle was limited to only one case of beer. We decided to stay an extra day in Kunnunura. The campsite was set around a pretty lake and it had a good swimming pool (still necessary in the heat of the day) and there were a few families staying so the girls had a great time with new friends. From Kunnunura we headed to the Purnululu National Park. Here we were also going to meet up with our friends Rhys and Jane who had left Queensland to tour the Centre and North West of Australia. Since we had met them last they had ordered a MAN truck and we're going to be having a camper built on the back, so lots of truck conversation ensued when we met. It was great to see them again and we had a number of wonderful evenings chatting, sharing dinner and enjoying a bottle of wine. The temperature was great as it cooled down nicely in the evening and there was the added bonus of hardly any insects as well so perfect for sitting outside. We spent our days (or more accurately our mornings before it became too hot) walking and enjoying the spectacular scenery of the park. It was a truly beautiful place. The Bungle Bungle Range is renowned for its striking banded domes. They are made of sandstone deposited about 360 million years ago. Erosion by creeks, rivers and weathering in the past 20 million years has carved out these domes along with spectacular chasms and gorges, creating a surreal landscape. It was wonderful to walk around the domes, admire views over them and then to enter massive Cathedral gorge. Walking to Echidna Chasm required getting the timing right as it is such a narrow chasm that the sunlight only pierces it for a very short time of the day. The chasm is 180 metres deep and very narrow and the rocks glowed orange as the sunlight hit them. Enjoying sunset on our last night we could reflect on how spectacular the park was how much we had enjoyed the last few days. After saying our goodbyes to Rees and Jayne we headed back to Kununurra to restock again before heading back out for more of the Kimberleys.

It sounds like the sort of joke the girls love: "How many Overlanders does it take to kill a mosquito?" The answer: "Three. One with the fly swat, one with the electrical mozzie zapper and one pointing them out while laughing manically and turning summersaults on the bed." Actually it wasn't just one mozzie but a whole cloud of them. Here in the Top End of Australia where one mosquito goes so does thousands of its friends, there is no shortage of them here. All of them searching for blood from an innocent victim. Almost to the second as the sun set, they come out in droves. To add to the evening's discomfort the temperature didn't drop much below 30°C, even at night, and there was over 80% humidity. We've decided it's the humidity that does it for us, we've happily coped in hotter climates but increase the humidity and tempers in the truck start fraying. The Top End might have the most amazing waterfalls; stunning wetlands; an Aboriginal culture dating back 20,000 years and a 500km long sandstone escarpment but you have to sweat for it. We started the week in Darwin, the biggest town in the Northern Territory, we took the bus into town to check it out. The architecture is pretty modern as the town was almost completely destroyed by Cyclone Tracy just over 40 years ago. Just as the sightseeing started getting too much for the girls, we took them down to the harbour front pool. What a cool idea for such a hot town, a special wave pool just a few hundred metres from the centre. Especially when the real sea, just metres away, is filled with killer jelly fish and saltwater crocodiles. We spent the afternoon bobbing up and down on the waves in rubber rings and boogie boarding Anything with air con starts to sound pretty attractive in this humidity so we headed to the Northern Territories museum before the sunset market at Mindil Beach. Actually the museum was really interesting and the air con - bliss! The market was lots of fun with assorted "crafty" jewellery sort of stalls and a whole variety of food stalls. We felt far closer to Asia, with the smell of spices and curries drifting from the woks, than the rest of Australia. Which I guess is technically true. We joined the throngs of people down on the sandy beach watching the sunset while slurping mango smoothies. Leaving Darwin behind we headed south east for Kakadu, on Aboriginal land, it has been leased back to the National Parks board. "The Wet" has only just finished but we were hoping that most of the park would be open. The local Aboriginal people actually split the year into 6 seasons. Not just the insufficiently descriptive "Wet" and "Dry" that the European Australians have. My favourite one is Banggerreng, the "knock 'em down" storm season when the 2m high spear grass gets flattened. Thankfully, we have just missed that one. Our first afternoon was a beauty. We first went right to the edge of the park to the East Alligator river where it borders Arnheim Land, Aboriginal land that we would require a permit to go to. There is a road causeway across the river that we read was a good place to see salties (saltwater crocodiles) - not alligators, there aren't any in Australia but the first European explorers up here got a bit confused. Thankfully, considering who we saw there, there wasn't any sign of the crocs. Just some Aboriginal families catching fish for their tea. Rather them than me I think, I was so cautious I wouldn't even let the girls off the viewing platform away from the water on their own. I think salties have a well-deserved bad reputation. From there we took in the rock art sights at Ubirr, some of the paintings are over 20,000 years old. I loved the X-ray style of the barramundi fish. We climbed up the sandstone rocky outcrops to a fabulously lush green view of the wetlands. The breeze was balmy, blowing away all the bugs, as we sat on sun warmed rock and watched the sun sink below the horizon. What a perfect end to the day or so I thought...... I was just tucking the girls in, next to the fans under wet sarongs is the only way to stop them overheating at night, when the mozzies attacked. Following Steve into the truck, the army of insects formed ranks and attacked. An hour later, no sleep had been had but the truck's ceiling was splattered with exoskeletons and human blood. From that night on we took the cowards way out, eating earlier and going inside the truck as soon as the sun's last rays fell. Sitting smugly inside, we watched the little buggers sense our presence and bash themselves silly against our excellent mosquito nets. Still a few got in and enjoyed feasting on our restless bodies throughout the night. Despite the heat we really enjoyed Kakadu, there was further rock art sites to explore. The 3 big waterfalls: Jim Jim, Gunlom and Twin falls were all closed as they had a lot of rain the preceding week but we found a croc free waterfall to swim under at Maguk. The loveliest morning was when we went out onto Yellow Water Billabong at sunrise. We really got to see the wetlands up close, see lots of birds and some crocs at a safe distance. The girls have been studying Aboriginal art and culture over the previous month, at the visitors centre we joined a local lady painting using the cross hatching and x-ray style. It would take a long time to develop her steady hand and technique but we spent over an hour having a go at it. A couple of days later in the south of the park a couple of delightful older ladies showed us how to weave bracelets out of pandanus leaves. The ladies explained which plants they used to dye the fibres and showed us how to strip the leaves, which they usually weave into baskets. Back at the campsite we tried our hand at the more familiar dot style paintings. Just south of the park is Nitmiluk National Park which has the double level Edith Waterfalls, as it had a tar road in it was open despite the recent rain. A half an hour hike uphill in the baking afternoon sun took us to the wonderfully cool top pool. The water streamed off the red sandstone above us into two big pools. There was a fast current of water between them which the girls loved zooming through. It was pretty and gorgeously cold. Another hike back down the other side of the falls took us to the huge pool under the lower falls for another cool off. It was another hot sweaty night in the park but Steve assures me that as we head south-west that the humidity should drop, let's hope the mozzies disappear with it too.