FRIDAY 23 JUNE – MONDAY 26 JUNE     LITCHFIELD

The days went by, mostly  in the usual pattern.

There was one unusual occurrence on Friday. A strange helicopter came in and landed in a cloud of dust, not far from “our” one. A man bustled out of it – I was watching through the kitchen window – and went towards the front of the cafe. He was wearing the large, broad brimmed hat favoured by many of the pastoralists up this way, and the usual moleskin type trousers and check shirt.

Then I got busy cooking and next thing heard the chopper taking off again, only about five minutes after it had come in. When I queried B about it, she said it was the boss of nearby LaBelle Station. He was out mustering, and had run out of cigarettes, so just dropped in to buy some!

We had noted the board at the front of our area, advertising LaBelle to tourists – for accommodation, fishing tours, boat trips. I had not heard of the place before we came here and was rather intrigued, so hoped to get a chance to visit there before we finished up here.

John had taken to spruiking the cafe’s mango cheesecake to the lunching bus groups and encouraging them to venture into the cafe to buy a piece. As a result, the consumption of the watermelon slices that were provided with the buffet lunches, went down, the sales of cheesecakes slices went up – and I regularly had to work late making three or four cheesecakes for the next day!

Monday night, John and M went to Batchelor to play bowls.