TUESDAY 16 MAY     LITCHFIELD

Day off.

I did our washing.

Then we drove to Batchelor.

We saw a mechanic there. he was not sure what might be wrong with the clutch. There went that hope of a quick and easy fix. We would have to go to Darwin, sometime soon, to get it seen to.

At the PO/store, collected a mail parcel that contained all my cooking aprons, that I’d made for use at Pungalina last year. I hadn’t brought them with me, because I had not expected to be cooking, at Adels. Amongst them were the striped ones that I’d made for John’s use at Pungalina, although he had rarely needed them. They would be useful for him here, when he was helping with the bus groups lunches, and especially when doing the washing up from same.

I had been hoping to hear that my next grandchild was born, by now, so I could have sent a card and gift whilst in Batchelor, but it apparently had not yet made an appearance in the world.

On the way back to camp, stopped at the Magnetic Termite Mounds and did the circuit walk there.

The name of these was misleading, because the mounds themselves were not magnetic. They were built to have really thin sides that faced north-south, and broad sides that faced east-west. This alignment was in response to the sun and the necessary heating and cooling  of the mound interiors, not from any sense of the Earth’s magnetism.

Called in at Tolmer Falls again, for another walk to the viewing platform and gaze at the spectacular falls.