This missive cometh to you from the Gulfland Motel in Normanton, a nice little town in Outback Queensland.

Since the last update, we’ve traversed the Northern Territory, gone through two time zones, camped in the Litchfield, Nitmiluk and Kakadu National Parks, partied in Darwin (a den of iniquitous pleasures, where the Dreamboat and Your Correspondent were somehow compelled to each drink seven pints of Kilkenny in one evening), met lots more amazing people, been bitten by every mosquito in the Southern Hemisphere, climbed cliffs, done dozens of nature walks, swum in natural hot springs, showered in waterfalls, spotted a few salties (saltwater crocodiles) and devoured more eggs.

We crossed the Territory/Queensland border yesterday. Total distance covered so far: 6,953 kilometres (4,340 miles). Nearly 2,000 of those kilometres have been over rough, corrugated dirt roads … which is why the Dreamboat had to buy a full set of new tyres for the fiery chariot in Darwin.

The hangover count is now in double figures, we’re a week ahead of schedule, Your Correspondent was informed she doesn’t have Ross River Fever (but does have an elevated white blood cell count, so another blood test’s in order if she starts rolling around and twitching on the ground for any reason other than excessive alcohol intake) and we still actually want to marry each other. All in all: satisfactory progress.

And that’s about it for now. I can’t really get into any specifics because a couple of days ago I accidentally left my hand-written journal containing all of my trip notes at the Heartbreak Hotel at Cape Crawford in the Territory (“Cape” Crawford, incidentally, is a misnomer – the place is 70 kilometres away from the coast). Apparently, the mail truck is due to come through next Thursday, so hopefully the journal will be waiting for us in Brissie.

Here’s a pic of a little friend we made at Kakadu National Park. He can keep y’all company ‘til the next update.



PS: I've just realised hot water has recently celebrated its second birthday. Yay!

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Hello from Kununurra

We've travelled 3,400 kilometres since leaving Karratha and have just completed the Gibb River Road - one of Australia's greatest 4WD trips. This means we're roughly one-third of the way through the journey.

Although I'd dearly love to give you a full update on the thrills, spills and dramas experienced so far, there simply isn't time (this trip is so laden with stories that I'm seriously considering writing a book) so here are some snapshots of the more memorable events to date:

Day One: We get drunk at the Whim Creek Hotel and meet a guy who'd heard my last radio show the day before. He proves this by quoting parts of it back to me, word for word.

Day Two: We hit a kangaroo on the highway just past Sandfire Roadhouse at 3:30 in the afternoon (very unusual - the biggest risk times are dawn and dusk). It's badly injured but not dead, so the Dreamboat is forced to finish it off with his bare hands. He's devastated afterwards and the experience haunts him for days.

Day Five: The woman at the campsite down the hill from us at Middle Lagoon (north of Broome) changes her outfit six times between 7:00 and 11:00am. I count 29 mosquito bites about my person, including a real stonker on my chin. My chin, for god's sake.

Day Seven: We're in Broome for the night. The plan: get fish and chips and watch the latest Harry Potter movie at the open air cinema. What actually happens: we get totally rat-arsed with a couple of underground digging contractors, eat pizza, wave the Dreamboat's sword around on the grassed area of the motel complex where we're staying and mistakenly set off the place's burglar alarm while waiting for a taxi to a local pub.

Day Eleven: We leave Windjana Gorge at the start of the Gibb River Road after two night's camping and realise we have no aircon in the truck. We have no option but to drive 125km to Derby to get it fixed and consequently spend an unscheduled two days there waiting for a new hose to be flown up from Perth. While in Derby, we get very drunk with an old Aboriginal man in a local pub and Your Correspondent is tested at the local hospital for Ross River Fever (should get the results later today).

Day Sixteen: We're camping at Bell Gorge. The Dreamboat and Your Correspondent are sitting halfway up one of the gorge walls. Your Correspondent takes off her engagement ring while applying sunscreen and ... you've guessed it. It falls off her lap and bounces down the cliff. With every bounce Your Correspondent exclaims, "My ring!" in tones of increasing despair. Very luckily for me, it finally comes to rest in a rock fissure at the water's edge and the Dreamboat is able to retrieve it. I am sternly admonished to "never take the bloody thing off again" and I spend the next three hours bemoaning the fact that the gold's scratched.

Day Nineteen: While camping at Mornington, we hire the sole canoe at Sir John Gorge and have the entire place to ourselves for the day. The Dreamboat has forbidden me to tell you what we did there, so I'll just say we found the place 'inspiring'.

Day Twenty: We stop to offer help to a couple with a flat tyre, only to have one of our own tyres go down while we're there. It's our second flat on the trip so far -- not bad at all when you consider the poor family we meet a couple of days later at Drysdale Station. They've been stuck there for two weeks awaiting a new diff housing for their axle.

Day Twenty-Two: We drive 30 kilometres off the main road to Mt Elizabeth Station. It's the worst road we've experienced on the trip to date; the corrugations are headache-inducing and the dust is unbelievable. Upon reaching the station, we book in for a night's camping at $11.00 each -- cash only. To our embarrassment, we realise we only have $16.60 cash between us ... so we cancel the booking, drive the 30km back to the main road and continue for another two hours so we can spend the night in a place with good ole-fashioned EFTPOS facilities.

Day Twenty-Three: Your Correspondent is persuaded to get up at 5:00am in order to sit in a six-seater Cessna 270 and take a two-hour scenic flight to the Mitchell Falls. Much to her relief, she doesn't die. She celebrates the fact by getting very drunk that night and then stoically enduring enjoying a life-affirming hangover of epic proportions the next day.

Day Twenty-Four: There are eleven frogs in the outside toilet/ablution facility I've chosen to do my business in at Home Valley Station. A couple of hours later, they're joined by two enormous green specimens, one of which would be hard pressed to fit into my hand. Sometime in the middle of the night, the Dreamboat and I are awakened by a woman's muffled scream coming from the same toilet.

So, to summarise ... the damage so far:

One airconditioning hose
Two tyres
One bull-bar bracket
One scratched engagement ring
Two arguments and a couple of little spats
Six hangovers
One hundred and thirty-eight eggs
Possible Ross River Fever

Stay tuned for the next update (probably in a couple of weeks). It's bound to get better ...

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