As we cruised the wetlands we saw birds of every persuasion from eagles to Ibis’s to cockatoo's to.... well things we had never heard of before but needless to say they were colourful and exotic and were like all the parrots and love birds you would see in expensive pet shops at home.

We saw new born ducks and other young birds and all we could hope was that they wouldn't end up as some lazy crocodiles dinner later on in the day. Yes we saw Crocs, and we are glad that we saw them in a natural way rather than the jumping croc tours on the Adelaide RIver where they feed them pork chops and make them jump out of the water.

Seeing a croc in the wild is odd, they look menacing and you know they could snap you in half with very little effort but at the same time they are actually quite graceful and serene. They glide along at their own pace obviously afraid of no one or bask in the sun all day. Apparently 80% of their energy comes from the vitamins in the sun and they can actually survive for a year without eating by reducing their heart rate down to two beats per minute!

We were sad that we could’t access the Jim Jim falls as we had planned but as it was wet season the falls roads were all closed as they were also flooded over so you just couldn't get there, well without bumping into the odd croc or two!

We also swimming snakes, and apparently in the wet season they all search for dry land and they had found one in the camp sites restaurant just the other day. of course Jonathan was overjoyed at this news being terrified of snakes.

With the news that the falls were closed we decided to pack up camp and try to get ahead of ourselves and hit the road for the afternoon and see where we could get too.

After winding our way back through Kakuda (and I do mean winding as suddenly the roads were all twists and turns) we learnt a lesson!

Pack the camper van well and you won’t have any major problems. Pack the van quickly and when you get down the winding road your belongings will end up all over the floor! We had tins falling out of one of the overhead cupboards, coke cans falling out of the fridge (we forgot to put the pin in) and the tv kept banging into the wall. We pulled over many times and solved each of the problems as they arose but vowed to take more care next time. You only need these things to happen once, you learn from it and move on.

Just over three hours down the road we arrived at Katherine a small town along the Stuart Highway. We booked into a campsite about 8km out of town and got the bikes out and cycled into town.

Now this cycling seemed like a good idea, even in the burning hot Australian sun, and it was until Jonathan’s pedal flew off the bike! The thread mangled and unfixable. This is what you get for buying cheap bikes form K-Mart!

With no choice we headed of the remaining 1km into town to try and find a new pair of peddles. The peddles were a job too far for this outback town. The streets were quite full of not sober aborigines and they actually felt quite threatening at times as they shouted and cursed each other.

There was nothing else for it but to get back to the camp site and worry about new pedals when we get to Alice Springs.

Now cycling 5 miles on one pedal is no easy feat, if you don't believe me try it but we made it back to camp and both of us looked exhausted! Call it a mixture of heat and over optimism in thinking that the first time we went out on the bikes 10 miles would be no problem but we ached!

Feeling a bit sorry for ourselves and with aches and pains in all the wrong places (bicycle saddles are not what they used to be you know) we sat down for a pot noodle (yes a pot noodle) and chilled out for the night.

Tomorrow we plan another driving day as we try to get to Alice Springs ahead of schedule so hopefully we will be in Tennant Creek, time will tell.

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