We loaded up the Wombatmobile & headed south toward Palmerston to meet Chris' contacts at the Northern Territory Herbarium & to pick up the food & first aid we'd be needing be for the next 5 days. I think we were all excited to finally be "doing this thang!!"
(On our way, we saw our first wallaby!!)
The Herbarium staff was so welcoming to us & we got the full tour of their facility (enormous freezers, giant filing system of plant specimens, digitizing of specimen collection, etc) and we were even offered morning tea...
Over coffee, toast & carrot cake, we listened to the comedic put-downs between two well-seasoned botanists. They were the ones who warned us about the first leg of our trip and called it Kakadon't (that's been a growing frustration for the park -- numbers of visitors have been down in recent years because it's too hot & there are too many mosquitoes). They told us, in between jabs at one another, that we'd be anemic after two days in. Eek.
Our shopping list included the following: bread, crackers, peanut butter, pasta, sauce, trail mix, granola bars, ramen noodles, sunscreen, tp, tortillas, rice, canned beans, canned fruit, canned corn, canned chili & beef stew, lots of flavoured tuna, more Cheezels, pizza crusts, pretzels, cup-a-soup, instant oatmeal, dried fruit, jarred curry, canned lentils, potatoes, onions, sweet potatoes, lamington, lettuce, tomato, shredded mozzerella & shredded cheddar (the Wombatmobile has a fridge the size of a paper grocery bag).
Our camp dinner menu :
-- burritos with rice, chili, cheese & corn
-- lentil curry with rice & potatoes
-- spaghetti with tomato sauce
-- pizza and salad
-- beef stew & potatoes
Lunches are 2 slices bread with either peanut butter or a can of tuna and a granola bar. Today I had tuna with sun-dried tomatoes and basil and it was pretty tasty, but I'm getting ahead myself.
As with every other camping trip the Martines have been on, this one started out rather auspiciously. It started to rain about 20 minutes after take-off & then poured most of our way to Kakadu. BUT Chris Martine being Chris Martine, we made it to the visitor's center with 15 minutes til closing time & were able to snag a researcher's cabin. Big, giant phew!!!
Despite the multitude of insect carcasses & the gecko that's eyeing me from the corner of the bedroom, we are counting our blessings (the laundry hanging in the bedroom doubles as curtains).
Shortly after unpacking, we walked outside to see a sky filled with flying foxes -- about 30 of them were skydiving around in search of fruit. Really cool.
Today, we stopped at the campground we were supposed to be staying in & it was completely deserted except for the gecko in the bathroom stall that Isee tried to use (scream heard through most of Kakadu) & this poor guy:
(Those are meat ants finishing off a cane toad).
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