Katherine Outback Experience

We had a lovely evening at the Katherine Outback Experience.  We have lived in Katherine for over 2 years and have never been here before.  It is now on our list of places to take guests.   My kids enjoyed watching Tom Curtain brake in a wild horse and he also showed us how he trains dogs to work on the cattle stations.  It was a fun evening!

He even sang to us while riding a horse.

Cody was in love with all the animals running around.

While we were getting ready to leave,

we got to enjoy this beautiful sunset.

Nitmiluk (Katherine) Gorge

Last week we left the kids with some friends and took Rachel and Jeff to the Katherine Gorge to do the boat ride.  I love this place and can't get enough!  Here are a few photos from our day.

Next time I want to do the dinner cruise!

JC Epidemic BMX and FMX

Tonight we went to our local YMCA for a JC Epidemic event.  I've never heard of them before, but thought it would be fun.  Plus there was free food and drinks and a bouncy house.  Who could resist.  :)  We had a fun night watching the freestyle BMX and freestyle motorcross.  Here is Jeff and Cody with the two motor cross guys.  Cody loved the show, in fact we stayed for all three shows!  They kept getting crazier!  And below is a video I got of both the BMX and FMX going at the same time.  Insane!  Now to keep Cody from trying some crazy stunt.  He asked me before falling asleep how he could get his bike on the roof!  Ahhh!

Geo Caching

This week Jeff and I took a bike ride and found some geocaches here in Katherine.  I've never done this before and it was lots of fun.  I felt like a detective!  We found 2 on this day.  Hope to get out again soon and find some more.

Territory Day ~ 1 July

It's nice to have Territory Day so close to Independence Day. 

That means we still get fireworks!

Cutta Cutta Caves, Katherine, Northern Territory

Yesterday we went to Cutta Cutta Caves with some other homeschoolers in our area.  Cutta Cutta means a place of many stars.  When a word is doubled it means place of many.  The indigenous people believe the stars would go down into the cave during the day (because when light shines on the crystal formations they sparkle like stars) and explode into the sky at night. 

We had 4 families go along.  One was a new family we recently met whose son is in scouts with Autumn.  It was lovely to get to chat with the other mums before we began the tour and some of the mums went out for coffee afterwards.  It's just nice having that support system and being able to talk to people who understand.  In our tour group was another lady who came just as a tourist, she got to chatting with the homeschoolers.  Turns out she is planning to homeschool in the future, and was thrilled to meet up with us.  Here are a few photos of our tour.

The walking path to the cave.

Going down into the cave.

Poor Cody fell on the path to the caves and got a big cut on his hand and knee.

Uncle Jeff carried him since his knee was hurting.

Even though it's the dry season there was some water droplets.

Exploring on the way back.  One of the kids found a cool spider web.

Our group minus the two taking photos.

Nitmiluk (Katherine) Gorge

This weekend we had some friends from Darwin come visit us. This may be the only time they see Katherine, so we decided to do the Nitmiluk Gorge's 2 hour boat ride.  It is a bit expensive, but so worth it!  I would go again in a heartbeat.  It's incredible to think that this is practically in our back yard. 

There are 13 gorges altogether, but you can only see the first few by boat.  In fact we took two boat rides.  The first boat took us to the first gorge, then we got off the boat, walked a little ways and got on another boat and went to the next gorge.  The second boat could only go so far as well, but it was gorgeous.  You can see the next gorge by getting on another boat, but that costs more.  To see all 13 gorges you can take a helicopter ride...maybe someday!

I was kicking myself for forgetting my good camera,

these photos are all taken from my iPhone.

Aboriginal drawings on the rock.

These rocks separated the first and second gorge.

 

We had a great tour guide, who added little funny jokes just to see if we were listening, I think!

Can you see the crocodile along the bank?

It's hard to see, but these trees were filled with bats.

Photos don't really do it justice!

Me and the kids

A rare photo of the two of us