Day 195 | at Crater Lake for the night: and great to get a decent sleep after last night's activities by the neighbours
55 km | Heading west total: 8,508 km
I enjoy the surprise of bush camping.
That’s where you don’t stay in a designated campsite but just find a place somewhere along the road. It’s good to have the place to yourself without having to answer people’s questions or have to deal with their past imperfect toilet options. You have to be a little prepared to camp out, ie, having sufficient water for the next day.
Serendipity: it’s whatever you find at the first spot after the time goes 5 30 pm. I just look for a track off the main road and try and find a place that can’t be too easily seen. You don’t have to be completely concealed because the cars are cruising by at 100+ km/hour and can’t see much off the road.
Tonight was a special place, I’d headed down Crater Lake Road which is a short cut from Batchelor to the Stuart Highway when you want to head south rather than go back to Darwin. The road itself hadn’t looked too promising with the speargrass often 3m tall by the roadside: no camping possible there. A faint 4WD track presented itself at the appropriate time so I headed down it. There are generally no signs at turnoffs in the Northern Territory, people nick them and usually just the post they were once attached to remains.
Here was the Crater Lake with its birds and insects. A great find and unlike last night with the all night clear felling enterprise and disco dance party on the adjacent campsite I had the place to myself.
Perfect.