Katherine is just north of where the Gove Peninsular road comes out on the highway so we decided to make use of the shops and had to stop in at the post office for our latest school packages. We tracked down Repco and Josh bought a wheel brace that fits FOUR different nut sizes and some tyre repair plugs and tools as well which we thought might be worth stowing away ‘just in case’.
We headed back through Mataranka for the last time this trip and out onto the Roper Bar road. We camped near the Roper River but far enough away from the crocs to feel safe.
The old police station was next to us and there was some interesting history to it all and most importantly for the boys, the original lock-up was still there with the heavy metal door and small peep-hole opening.
The Roper Bar store and camping area are closed but the real estate signs say ‘under contract’ so there might be some enterprising person who could fix it up and get it back to the glory days of full campgrounds, river cruises, chopper flights, restaurant, bar and busy roadhouse.
Our repaired tyre decided to go flat overnight and on closer inspection was found to have split further along the tyre wall – likely due for the tyre scrapheap but we’ll see what the next tyre repair place has to say. The new wheel brace worked well, thanks for asking, let’s hope it doesn’t get much more use!
We headed into Limmen National Park and found the road to be fairly quiet this late in the season – many grey nomads and other travelers had begun the seasonal, climatically-influenced migration southwards away from the increasing temperatures. This was great because most campsites were empty or close to.
We stopped in at most of the campsites along the way, the creek crossings still had water over the road so late in the dry season and the beautiful Lomarieum Lagoon is full of birds and crocs plus spectacular lilies and other wetland plants.
Towns River crossing was a good spot so we pulled in there to set up camp – heaps of crocs so we chose a good shady protected spot back away from the river. There were fish flopping around on the surface but there was no interest in our lures but it was a good fishing spot up on a ledge out of snapping-jaw distance.
JALC-OZ-2018 