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November 17th, leaving day

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Evija writes:
In a while, getting up at 7:30am is wonderful! However, from another point of view – strange. Anders and Rūdolfs most likely are in the airport already… I say goodbye to Emīls after the breakfast (we were both hosted by Inga and Mārtiņš Česlis family) – he will do some sightseeing around Brisbane center and then go to the airport as well. Guna, Gunta, Agnese are trying to get some beach experience, did it work out? – there were heavy downpours, lightnings, thunders in the morning.

Me – Evija, and Ilgonis have the last meeting with Latvians today – in Brisbane Latvia house. I tell very shortly about the activities of the University of Latvia fund, but I definitely want to share the video with the “thank you”s by the stipendiaries. The gathered Latvians are keen to listen to Ilgonis’ Solar Eclipse story, and to view photos and video – this is the first time it is shown in public. The Latvians of Brisbane are warm-hearted, sunny, open and joyful! It looks like the honorary consul Juris Meija has come as well. Also he had some stories about the life here.

In general I defined my feelings about Australians here in Brisbane today – calm, leisurely, harmonic and happy. I think that such are indeed the Latvians all around Australia.

After the nice meeting with Latvians, the host Andris Francis takes and follows me and Ilgonis to Brisbane planetarium – we watch a 3D film – ooh, my head is spinning! Impressive! After that a view from the highest hilltop to Brisbane’s big buildings and then we are ready to go to Inga and Mārtiņš Česlis house where there is a do for Mārtiņdiena (day of Mārtiņš) being organized. Many local Latvians (and not only Latvians) have turned up, we are around 30 people all together. It is interesting that most of the people are in their forties come with their families and a few children – hubbub, alacrity, laughter and conversations non stop!!! Zigrīda Francis’ big pretzel has baked well and was very tasty! The cheese salad made by another Latvian were gone from the table very quickly as well… Looks like I’m in Latvia in my mind already. From our group only me, Ilgonis, Guna, Gunta, Agnese have stayed here for couple of hours – the last 4 will go straight to airport after the party while I’ll be still waiting for the morning…

To get to know Australia at least a little bit – nature, Latvians, dare oneselve’s egoism in different situations in combination of 8 people – that’s fantastic and worth the experience!

Bye, till the next Total solar eclipse!!!

November 16th – finally in Brisbane

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Rūdolfs writes:
We wake up at 5:00 and prepare breakfast and collect the belongings at the same time because today need to give back the car and can’t be lingering. There are some 500-550km left to Brisbane. We sort the car properties to their places and go through to check.
My burned legs are feeling better today. Still need put medicine often, has to be done.

Along the way, a light came on, which says that the fuel stays for around 100km. Soon we stop at Caltex gas station, fill up and go on.
I continue to stay out of the sun in the car saloon to protect my legs. Otherwise, I can feel them too well in the sun.

Time to change drivers. The sun was shining on the driver’s side and I didn’t want to steer, but circumstances meant that I had to go until near Brisbane. I took a towel and put on top of my legs. With time running, I realized that it is not enough, because I still feel more pain. I decided that the next stop I will go back to the shadow in the back.

The scenery changes, the roads are wider and the traffic increase. The speed limit is higher, but we stick to 100km/h. A short time later I realize that the end could become tense. We decided to stop aside and discuss. Some people aren’t in good mood, but it can be understood. I’m staying in car and hardly engaging in discussions. How I understand they decided to throw me out first at the place where I’ll stay for this night. For the beginning the idea was to throw me out somewhere in the city with all the stuff, where I would be waiting for Anders. Then we would transfer any remaining items in the second car. So first car can be cleaned and given back. At the second car are all the others and luggage. Cleaning them somewhere and drop off. Finish talking and continuing journey.

I start collecting to backseat all my items which were scattered through the cabin, as most wires and all sorts of things were mine. The large backpack isn’t at a comfortable position to fill it and the small one need repacking. At the end I gathered everything in one spot.

Soon we arrive at the place where me and Anders will spend the night, but the owner isn’t at home yet. Need to wait at the front of the house. We are starting to take Anders’ and my belongings out of car and drop at corner of the house where I can hide in a shadow. Then the first car is empty and the other stuff moved to the second car as planned.We are also sharing things and bottles of beer, which I wasn’t allowed to drink and WC paper – it is a lot. That is because in each toilet there was paper even in the middle of the desert. For that we all were surprised.

When finished removing of all of my and Anders’ belongings it was quite a spectacular view to the pile. I recheck to make sure everything was taken out. They are debating what to do next while I hide in the shadow.
Saying goodbye to some people, because we didn’t know for sure if we would see each other in evening. Then everyone jumped in car and started driving, leaving me alone with a pile of stuff. I’m a little surprised that the pile is so big.

While waiting for house owner curious people looked to my direction and some came up to talk to me.
Soon the owner Dace arrived with her son. We greeted each other. I was welcomed and shown the house and our sleeping place, which is a whole big room. The house is nice and wide.
We talk and I began to carry our belongings from the outside to the room and the son also helps me, even though being shy. He need go to play tennis so I am left alone for a moment. We arranged that I contact Anders and give him instruction where he should be and that we will wait him at the train station.

Now it is time to go pickup Anders, but we arrived too early and decided to go to the tennis court where Dace’s son is playing tennis. Soon we went back and Anders was in front of us.
Soon we are back at home and also the rest of family members are at house. We introduce ourselves to each other. Parents, daughter and son and two of us. We started to talk about all sorts of topics, the tour, the solar eclipse and non-travel related matters.

So that is already evening and is time to meet the rest of the team at the city. But the family has invited us to dinner. Me and Anders decided to stay, but then we were missing the ferry trip, because they already are in the centre.
Tonight we have the honour of homemade pizza for dinner.

Tent! It is still wet, Anders says. We got a permission to put the tent in the yard and are jokingly saying that we are staying the night there. Outside is quite windy and Dace’s husband says that tonight / morning there will be a storm.

Pizza is getting ready and we guys are starting to drink beer and I allowed myself. Yes, 1:1 draw right now :D
Time goes nicely together. Approaching is the time when we would have to make it to the city to meet the rest of the team. They would already have completed the ferry ride. Anders receive a call, they will soon stop at the coast. I and Anders are discussing what to do next. The time that is left comes to end. That time left is no longer then just to go to the city to say goodbye and back. Again, rush. We came to the conclusion that tonight we won’t rush anywhere, but nicely spend it together with the family. Anders told Agnese our idea, sounded like she wasn’t really excited about our plan.

After the dinner we took a look at some pictures and tour, solar eclipse video. I was hoping that I had not burned camera matrix by holding towards the sun while watching the sun eclipse, but no, turns out to be much better and not so bad and not close to a white screen as it is a wide angle camera. Speeding the film of the eclipse and the file ended up, I think it shouldn’t have happened that the film just ended in middle. (Days later it appeared that when a certain amount is reached it is written in the next file with a different name, not as customary in a row. I found that out when I checked at home which file is the biggest.)

It’s already late and we are all starting to go to sleep. We still need to fill up our backpacks for tomorrow to go to the airport. Dace’s husband offered to take us on the way to work. Although a few hours earlier, but we are comfortable with it.
Evening is hearty and spent in a leisurely atmosphere.
Goodnight :)

November 15th: Guthalungra to Benaraby, 691 km

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Anders writes:
I woke up at 6 o clock, the sun was up as well as most of my friends (Later that day I found out that I was supposed to have waken up at 5.30). There was breakfast of eggs, sausage and fried potatoes in the making over at the picnic table. At 8 o’clock we set out for another long day of driving. First stop was Big Mango in Bowen, one of many “Big Thing” roadside attractions in Australia (we also visited the Big Winch in Coober Pedy). There was some confusion when we were unable to spot any gigantic fruits or vegetables anywhere in the town of Bowen. Nobody had bothered to check more precisely where the thing was located. It turned out the mango was actually located next to the highway, 4 km south of town.

I can’t remember eating lunch. We may have made some sandwiches in the car. There was some nice views of the ocean. Roadworks and more roadworks. There was no way we could reach Brisbane before midnight. Instead we raced (without speeding) towards Capricorn Caves and arrived just in time to catch the last tour of the day. The guys went spelunking, the girls stayed at the visitors center. The limestone caves were impressive. At the cave entrance we saw a rock-wallaby. The hall called “Cathedral Cave” is sometimes used for weddings and concerts and the acoustics is supposed to be nearly perfect. Emīls sang a song for us! On the way out we went through a very narrow winding passage, naturally created by the erosion of water.

Just before we arrived at our campsite for the night we stopped to look at and take some pictures of the new moon – it was possible to see “earthshine” on the darker portion.

For dinner we had all kinds of leftovers. I got a beer from Rūdolfs but Agnese had convinced him that he shouldn’t drink any beer himself, or his sunburnt legs wouldn’t heal as good. I thought it sounded like nonsense and tried to get him to change his mind but with no success. Reason 1 – Beer 0.

November 14th: A total eclipse in Cairns.

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Emīls writes:
This morning began very early. I’ve slept for some two hours because me and Agnese decided to join Couch Surfers at their beach party. So we spent a few hours at the fireplace near the ocean and talked a lot about astronomy at the same time looking high in the sky. There were clouds but there were some stars as well. At the beach we could see the low tide – the water was more than a hundred meters away. Maybe even two hundreds – it was hard to tell in the dark. When we went in the water and started splashing, we could see strange lights. I think it was luminescence of plankton. It was the first time I see something like this.

In the morning at 5 AM we went to the reserved place on the beach where we planned to observe the eclipse. There were not so many people as I thought there would because the sky was quite cloudy. We observed the sunrise at the horizon, bet when the Moon started to eclipse the Sun 10 minutes after the sunrise, the clouds came over. So we saw the eclipsed Sun only when the Moon had covered almost half of the Sun. I managed to get nice pictures although there were many clouds blocking the Sun for certain moments. Only a few minutes before the full phase we started to notice that the light becomes strange, clouds in the sky started to become pink, sky at the horizon became orange, just like after sunset. When the full eclipse began, many people started to shout, clap their hands and so on. In a moment the clouds separated and we could see the eclipsed Sun with its corona shining beautifully around it. All photographers grabbed their cameras and started to take pictures, some people filmed the event. In two minutes the full phase ended, producing a spectacular diamond ring – an effect when the Moon reveals the first bright-shining part of the Sun (Sun’s photosphere). Maybe the view from other places in Cairns wouldn’t be so good because of the clouds. But we got really lucky. At the end of the eclipse we noticed some interesting shadows on the ground and on buildings – leaves from trees produced many images of the crescent Sun.

Straight after the eclipse ended we went home, took our bags and went to the south of Cairns. We visited one waterfall that was on our way, but it didn’t put a big impression on me. We spent the rest of the day driving in cars. On our way we stopped to buy some delicious bananas, watermelon. In the supped we had mashed potatoes with canned meat. We felt quite tired because of the long way and many hours spent in the cars. Even this night was clear with skies full of stars, I didn’t have much energy left to look for some unknown constellations. So I went to sleep quite soon.

November 13th: The Great Barrier Reef

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Ilgonis writes:
Today we experience a different Australia, we go by ships to Great Barrier Reef. We have booked tickets at three different companies, but reefs are quite the same, only the level of service is different. I have chosen the cheapest company [Compass].

Crew is very kind and lunch is excellent, only freshwater showers are missing. On the way to reefs waves are high and ship rocks seriously. Some people become seasick. When we arrive, I go for a snorkeling. Waves are still high and it is not so easy to go even 15 meters to the reef. But I did it and I am rewarded with nice view of tropical fish and corals. Evija swims just outside the ship. Our boys Emīls and Rūdolfs are full of energy and spend a lot of time snorkeling. Rūdolfs films a video with the underwater camera. Emīls makes his first dive ever with aqualung and is very excited about it.

After lunch we go to another reef. I decide to go or a ride in a glass bottom boat. It is a really nice view when all those sea creatures wander below your feet. Boys continue snorkeling. Unfortunately Rūdolfs does not apply sun protection cream and gets severe sunburn on the back part of his legs which are not covered by wetsuit. Who could imagine that you can get sunburn, swimming underwater! On the way back waves are even higher but we successfully reach the shore and are eager to share our new experience to each other. Nice day.

November 12th: The amazing flora and fauna in Cairns

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Guna writes:
This is the first day in Cairns. We have spent night in our hosts’ – Andrejs and Zita, garden. After breakfast Andrejs offers us to show the mangrove forest, which is quite unique as one of the few wild mangrove groves in the world that is protected bio reserve. The groves are so out-of-this-world and nothing like even Gunta has ever seen. We take some… ok, many pictures of crabs and weird fish with big eyes able to move outside water – the mudskipper fish. The mangroves are a real jungle and a bit scary. If there was no broad walk to guide us through the grove, one would definitely get lost in there. Andrejs shows us the black-widow-style spider who eats it’s male partners after they have stopped being useful. Despite occasional warm drizzle interchanging with scorching sun filtering through the vividly green canopy we have a great time in this weird place.

Afterwards Andrejs takes us to the city library which is not so boring as it sounds. As we realize this as soon as we get out of our cars. The noise is constant and the source is the main object that we have come to see – the flying foxes or the big fruit bats have besieged the nearby trees around the library. Although it’s daytime and theoretically the bats are supposed to be sleeping, it is a very noisy sleeping. There are thousands of them. It sounds like they argue and chat and love each other at the same time making quite a noise. Now I understand where the legends of vampires and batmen come from, because they really look like batmen silhouetted against Cairn’s cloudy sky.

Interestingly the parking areas under these trees are free of charge not like the surrounding parking places. Still by parking your car under these trees you are is risking getting your car pretty dirty. We also have a quick step in the library to check out Zita’s fabulous picture of the bats – a present to the library.

Afterwards we take a walk down the beach which is lovely but the public pool just beside it looks much more inviting. The latter lets you feel like being in some kind of exotic beach with white sand and clear turquoise water. We observe some more local birds which Andrejs is very familiar with and of which, I believe, Anders understands much more.
The day goes by quickly but on our way home we just have a run in the local botanical gardens where I first see in real life a pond of lotus flowers. No wonder the flower has a fame, it s really beautiful.

We return home to grab some quick lunch before heading for the local zoo suggested by our hosts. We arrive at the zoo just in time to see the end of the crocodiles feeding show. In one house the local workers are in the process of making the koalas mate but I guess none of the two koala boys was going to get lucky today as the koala girl was screaming something fierce every time any one of them tried their moves on her. Agnese and I battle our inner battles and quickly lose to quite expensive koala holding sessions, but how can one come to Australia and not hold a koala – the incarnation of peace and all the cuddly things one can imagine! Our lovely koala girl Keyla is patient and bears with us the brief photo session.

Afterwards we catch the bird show which reminds me a bit of a circus of trained birds, still impressive and we get to see the really big blue butterflies just flying around in their home habitat.
It’s time to visit and feed some kangaroos and wallabies. This is the first time in Australia that we get actually close to these creatures as in the wild you just get to watch them gracefully hopping away.
The zoo is just about to close so a quick peek at the pelicans and we are off.

On our way home we stop by the Palm Grove beach. The water here near the shore is not the clear blue we would expect, rather it is muddy light brown and the waves just make the water more like Baltic Sea beach. Well, ok… the waves probably are bigger and the water is definitely warmer. Here you are only allowed to swim in the area enclosed by nets, and a lifeguard on duty. Only Ilgonis and Emīls are going for a swim, but I opt for walking down the beach and taking in the wonderful scenery.

Since we started our road trip this is the first evening in a long time that we eat our dinner actually before the sunset. It is wonderful, we are sitting outside in our hosts’ garden and enjoying ourselves for some time before some of us go and meet Mr Aleksandrs Gārša – an honorary consul for Latvia and a lawyer. Anders and Rūdolfs opt for staying at home.
Glass of wine with Mr Gārša and his wife is very cordial. We have some Tasmanian wine and cheese as well as Australian strawberries.
After coffee which comes from highlands just outside of Cairns and a group photo we head back home.

Turns out that during day the rain has got inside our tent, it is wet and really not a good place to sleep in. So Agnese and I take up on hosts’ generous offer to stay in Zita’s studio. And that’s when I find out that this day was supposed to be written about by me. So here I am sitting down on the floor of Zita’s studio and frantically trying to remember another day full of new impressions. Need for sleep is overwhelming so I will let others to take over from here to write about next day and new adventures that, no doubt, await us.

November 11th – we have got till Cairns

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Gunta writes:
It’s Lāčplēsis day today. We get up at 5:30 and leave at 7:30. The Sun rises after 5:30. The place where we camped was good. When we arrived last night, there was a warning that there might be crocodiles, but it’s not like that as we are high above river banks. There are 2 big bridges over the river – one railway and the other – auto. There are many vehicles and trailers in the campsite. We meet a man from Switzerland who has been traveling for a long time – since 2007. He says he has caught lots of fish. Ilgonis wants a fish, but there’s nothing to give in return.

We are going to Cairns, beautiful hilly road, cattle is grazing on road sides – cows, calves, horses. It has been burning again on roadsides. We conclude that everything burns down, but the termites survive. The surroundings are changing. The road becomes lonelier, many warnings about road flooding. Sometimes there are empty cars left on roadsides. We are wondering whether those are the ones broken down in flood or left after crashes as a warning for people to not go so fast.

Near Townsville oleanders, rhododendrons and African tulip trees are blooming. We want to get to the sea and are heading towards Toomulla beach [Agnese’s comment – because that’s the closest to the highway]. We park almost on the shore. Short walks. The Saltwater Creek is flowing into the ocean here, it should be fine to go into the water of the creek. It is not fine to go into the ocean water as if the water is calm, there might be the small box jellyfish here, which are deadly. We can see beautiful shells that have been washed out of the sea and broken corals.

There are nice, green fields. We have several ideas, but Anders says – sugar canes. On one side of the road – hills, on the other – beautiful ranch houses with palms.

A stop and a walk at Tyto Wetlands park. The ground is cracked. Emīls realizes that there’s almost no shadow. On palm trunks there are ferns growing, there are tropical plants all around. Trees with interesting fruits, similar to rambutans from Indonesia. We are listening to bird songs. It’s hot, sweating, temperature surely around 35 degrees. In the lake there are ducks swimming and some white waterbirds. Anders and Rūdolfs are seriously observing everything. There are ants nests among bush branches and canes. Then something is rustling in the grass. We are sending Rūdolfs ahead. It seems that someone flees. On our way back – photo with a small wallaby who is fearfully hiding under bushes. Then he gathers courage and makes a mighty jump over the road.

We are going further. The surroundings have changed – rain forests, cultivated fields, plantations with bananas. Local vegetables and fruits are being sold. We buy 2 watermelons – and eat one at once. Very tasty, sweet. Then comes Cairns – green, blooming. We find Andrejs’ house and park in the yard. There are diverse plants here – a cocos palm with coconuts, pineapples, pomelo, flowers, blooming bushes. There are poisonous toads living in the garden.

Then dinner with seafood, rice and wine. Conversations going on, we are checking Andrejs’ photo albums, listening about local birds, plants. Drinking tea with eucalyptus leaves which have been gathered in Zita’s care in the garden. Late we are going to sleep.

November 10th – on the way to civilisation

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Agnese writes:
Yesterday we noticed that both our paper maps show 100km stretch of the route along gravel road (or dirt road as it’s being called here). There were 2 similar options – either to continue all the way to the coast and then go up to Cairns, or turn left in Cloncurry and take a parallel road 400km North. We decided to ask at the hostel. The nightguard was very talkative and told us much about flood and other weather conditions. He said the north road is closed sometimes 12 weeks a year due to flood. He hadn’t heard that it might be closed today, but it had rained a bit recently, and if we get till it and it’s closed, we’ll need to come all the 400km back.

I told him I was surprised about the 2m flood meter marks in many places along the road. I just couldn’t believe that the flood can be that high. He said 2 meters are normal. Apparently once a town north from Mt Isa, near the bay (Burketown?) got flooded by 7m of water – the whole town was evacuated.

We woke up at 5:30 as usual – there’s a long way ahead of us again. Quick breakfast with musli an yogurts and off we are. First to a hill in the middle of the town where we can see a nice scenery and many factories. This is a mining town – mines for silver, zinc, copper and lead can be found here and are the largest in Australia.

The road out of Mt Isa is not that boring anymore – ups and downs, winds and besides that road trains going to the opposite direction quite often. The town of Cloncurry holds the heat record of Australia – 53.1 Celsius degrees in shadow. After Cloncurry the road gets worse. Still a sealed road, but with many patches – quite like in Latvia :D

We spot 3 emu on the roadside – live ones! Lunch in a town of Richmond – for some reason it has been decorated with dinosaur pictures and models. Very boring road till the next town. One can notice we are driving towards more civilized part of this country due to petrol prices which get cheaper. Fueling up in Hughenden.

We arrive at our campsite soon after a beautiful sunset. At the entrance there’s a plate with a warning of crocodiles living in the nearby waters. The river is quite close, but it has very high banks, so the campsite is safe. There are toilets and showers here and a picnic table which we reserve for our dinner. Many other campervans are parked here, but the area is big so nobody disturbs others. The camel steak for the dinner is juicy and nice.

We are back in civilisation now – there’s phone coverage in our campsite! There hasn’t been such luck since long time!

There are also many stars, but a couple of clouds as well, so we don’t find everything we have seen previously.

November 9th – On the way to Mt Isa

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Rūdolfs writes:
We woke up at six o’clock, a half hour later than usual. For breakfast we had a fried egg with sausage slices, tomatoes and cucumbers. Collected and stacked all of our stuff and went back to the Devils Marbles. That was around 20km back, but the distance is not that big. Emils is driving. We went as usual and then suddenly there is a big bang. Something hit the windscreen. Turns out that it was a hawk whom Anderss was trying to find out to which species the it belonged to, but realized that didn’t have enough visual details. For Emil this is the first time when something like this happens. Concluded that the glass is intact and the hawk is not noticeable we continued on with our journey.

We were at the Devil Marble billboard, or in the local language Karlu Karlu. I started to video record surroundings and went to the information board. On the information board were written details of how many stones were rounded up to the present day. As well as local inhabitant stories about this area. The locals come here and told each other about their dreams.

There also is a story of a mother and daughter who had settled down near this area. It says that the daughter had been taking a walk across the Devils Marbles and the spirit of the earth that lived under the stones had started to play together with her. The daughter had not been able to stop playing and escape until the mother had pulled her out from between the stones and ever since hadn’t stayed here.

Meanwhile, everyone had went on their own to explore the area. Ilgonis was headed to the top. Agnese was not far behind him and I decided to tag along. We got to the highest accessible point. Top view is spectacular, though several locations were just as high or even higher, but apparently there was some kind of fence around few. After surveying the view I posed for few pictures and filmed 360-degree view with Go Pro Hero camera. I stayed there a bit longer, but when I turned around both of my friends were gone. After that I went to explore more rocks and walk around. I figured out that I needed to attach the camera to my head and change my sneakers to hiking boots. Went back to our car and get ready for a proper walk across the rocks. Adjusted camera and started to run along stones. I was running around and looking where it is harder and where easier to put my feet. I found myself in a place between two rocks where it looked awesome to climb up between them like you see Jackie Chan do in his movies. When I got to the top I saw that from the other rock the view is much better. I got on the other rock by jumping over and found myself to be on the highest place in this rocky ground. The 360 degree view was beautiful, albeit mostly there were burnt down grass and small trees, but on the other hand the running on these fields is easier without the grass, although mostly I run across the rocks. Enjoyed the surrounding views and jumped back, carefully where I needed to jump, because the ground was not so good, but soon enough I found an easier way to do it. Got to the other side and kept on running. Up and down, through gaps, so cool! Had enough of running, I walked outside of the track to see more, because I have run through to the other side of rocks.

I noticed a plate and went closer to see what was written on it. There was written about one crab species and frogs that lives in the area. Although it is mostly rather dry, but both during drought lives in self-excavated burrows, which are humid and then wait for the rain. A surprise on this, because once as a kid I watched a broadcasting about something similar, but never thought that someday I would be there. I went down the trail and the view on sides was not less impressive.

On another plate was written that chemical processes cause the surface of the blocks to expand and/or shrink. Thin layers of rock come off the boulder. This rounds the granite block, because the chemical processes have more effect on areas with edges. These processes cause the rock to look like it is made of layers like an onion. A bit further down the trail I encountered Anders next to a stone that looked like the ones in Stonehenge. Further I notice a stone that looks like a sausage and has inscriptions. I looked back and saw that some of our group were taking pictures of ants anthill. The area looked like a desert, although every now and then you can see bushes and small trees.

We arrived at Tennant Creek and there filled tanks with gasoline. Along roadside and beyond what your eyes can see where termite hills like towers even up to one meter. They were more than enough and to put up a tent in a place like that would not have been wise. Suddenly Ilgonis sharply stopped the car, put in reverse and then I noticed the reason for such action. Nearby road was huge termite hill, 2 meters high at least and the diameter of it was not small either. Ilgonis already with his camera was approaching it and I decided to go as well pick up my camera and went to look around the termite hill. I must say that the view was just spectacular. In one place a small fragment had fallen off and there one could see the cells. They were so huge and hardly any of us wanted to see the residents, even though it looked like it to be abandoned or hiding more deeply under the ground. We took some photos and both of us headed back to the car through the fields of termites watching where we put our feet.

Then ahead of us was a long straight road and it seemed that it would be much easier if we blocked the steering wheel and put a brick on the gas pedal. Wherever we looked all we could see were large clearings. In 360 degrees you could see the horizon. Afar only a few trees and herds of cows.

The dusk was approaching and I was behind the steering wheel. Then I noticed a pair of kangaroos next to the road, so I rapidly slowed down so that others could look at them and take photos. Nowadays it is a rare chance to see kangaroos in wild. They quickly disappeared from our eyesight. Then we continued with our journey and not long after we noticed another pair of kangaroos and again we slowed down to take a look at them. Overall, so far we had seen six kangaroos a day. Including today seen kangaroos it’s 10 now. During the heat of day they are hiding in shadows, but comes out usually when the weather is cooler. This day we got lucky because we managed to see so many. It is unfortunate that often would not notice. Maybe this way it is even better, than to hit them accidentally with car when they out of nowhere jump on a road.

We continued our journey to Mount Isa, it was a black night outside, but afar were visible lights indicating that we were not far from reaching Mount Isa. The closer we got to Mount Isa the more sight on the right side reminded of lit out power plant. The city during night looked magnificent and lively, after all the industrial work was active there. Found our hostel, parked our car, entered and the receptionist divided us in two rooms. Ilgonis, Anders and I were in one room and others in the second room. Our rooms were far from each other. Agnese put me to writing an article, some were making dinner, some were swimming in the pool or taking a shower. We all ate dinner together and discussed our events of this day.

Now that I have finished my article I can go to bed and have a good
night’s sleep. Goodnight. :)

November 8th -The trip to meteorite craters

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Emīls writes:
The morning begun very early – at 5 AM. Because we wanted to go to Henbury meteorite craters and we shouldn’t delay our teammates who stayed at hostel and should be ready at ~10 AM for leaving the city. Two boiled eggs and a yoghurt for breakfast. I had a lazanja from yesterday that I bought at Alice Spring’s supermarket, so I decided to eat it first since it was more delicious than just an ordinary egg with salt.

We are almost there at the craters. This time road is much better than before – no mud, no floods. Ilgonis is at the wheel. Just when I got out of the car I noticed we have a flat tire. Very flat. It could have been because of the gravel road which had quite big rocks on it. So the only thing we could do is change our tire with the one we had under our car. It was smaller and not fully pumped but it was the only way to get back to Alice Springs. After Ilgonis and Rūdolfs did that, we went to explore meteorite craters. They didn’t give me the impression that I was hoping for, but still it was interesting to see a place where a big rock from the space was fallen many thousand years ago. At the bottom of the craters there were trees and bushes, and water as well. Probably there are animals that come here to drink water. Just then we saw two kangaroos who were jumping away from us. I suppose we disturbed them. Later on the gravel road we saw two more kangaroos. So it’s more than in the whole trip together till now.

When we returned to Alice Springs, we went straight to the auto service. There we found out that the tire needs to be entirely replaced because the hole in it is too big. Additional expenses – 160 AUD.

Later that day we went in Tennant Creek’s direction. We decided not to go to Devils Marbles because of the approaching storm. We saw dark clouds, and in a moment it started to rain. Of course, there was also a fire in the desert as it should be traditionally – because we are looking for a place to camp. But we didn’t get alarmed, we just cooked supper – delicious pasta with bolognese sauce – and went to sleep. No stars tonight – it’s cloudy. Strange, but most of the nights we have spent in the middle of Australia’s desert were cloudy. There were only two nights till now when we were able to learn how to find southern constellations. Yet the Moon is approaching the Sun. 6 days till the total eclipse.