We went to our new house, but it still takes time to settle.
These are some pictures.

03.08.19

We really wanted to get this house, but it was a little out of price. We asked if they would let us pay a little less, but then they decided to sell instead. Because of that, we have looked at over thirty houses. Since the houses weren’t good enough, we needed to bump the price up a little. We looked at two Queenslanders today, and one yesterday. We also saw two houses which are nice. One was a very big house at a good price, but the problem was the landlord was lazy and didn’t clean it. Once I had saw a few cockroaches, I decided to count them. I counted 26, but Patrick counted 25(those were mainly in the garage). What was really gross was that there was a rat in the pool. The landlord doesn’t want to clean it until he has got tenants (people who will rent it) but I don’t think that he will get any tenant until he cleans it. Other than that and the palm leaves in the driveway, the house is pretty good.

We have also been looking at a few different schools. We went to two public schools- Dripstone and Nightcliff. I preferred Nightcliff. Dripstone felt too serious and too big. Nightcliff seem much happier. This might be because the Nightcliff tour was in the daytime, but the principal in Nightcliff was nicer. The principal is very important because he or she sets the atmosphere for the school. We also went to one Christian school, but we didn’t go on a tour. I thought it over carefully, thinking of the positives and negatives of going to a Christian schools and to Public schools, and I found more the positives bigger and the negatives easier to manage in Public schools than in Christian schools, so I think I would want to go to a Public school.

27.07.19

Over the last few days, we have been looking at lots of different houses. At first, we were considering staying in an apartment, but it wasn’t like the Russian apartments. Russian apartments are much better because they have a playground and the “courtyard” which is grassier (except for in the winter, and some parts of autumn, and some parts of spring). The apartments here are not like that, so apartments are ruled out

When you are searching for a place to live, you often remember the positives of a place, but not the negatives. You might take one thing you like about one hours, one thing you like about another, and you collect all these things to make an imaginary perfect house, which seems like somewhere you would want to live. Then you look at other houses after that, and since it does not look like your perfect imaginary house, you notice the differences- and all the differences are negatives, so you see so many negatives. At one house we saw, we felt this really good feeling, a sort of peace and joy and comfort. The house is called a Queenslander, which is a style invented in Queensland. It is only one story, but it is lifted of the ground on poles or whatever, so that the area under it can be used as a car park, and there can be a shed, and an outdoor area. Inside, it is very cosy. Robyn and I might share a room. That would work well because we both like art and we could share lots of stationary.

We will just have to wait for a reply.

21.07.19

We went from Tenant Creek to Mataranka. Mataranka is a very relaxing place with lots of tree and huge termite hills. Some of the termite hills are taller than I am! Yesterday we went to a swimming place which was called a thermal pool. It is actually a river, but it was dammed so that you can swim in it. It the evening, we went to this sort of restaurant (you go to a lot of those on road trips).

We met an Aboriginal lady and her name was Vivian. Mum and Dad talked to her, but then I continued talking to her when they had finished. We talked about Jesus. Well, Dad brought up Jesus. He always odes that. Vivian kept mentioning she went to church every Sunday, every Sunday. Dad thinks she was probably Catholic, because she made the cross sign. Orthodox people also make that sign, but there are no Orthodox Aboriginals in Australia. Dad laughed when he thought of the that. Vivian was soon pouring out her heart in what she was saying, I prayed for her, and told Jesus wants to come to us as we are. Vivian told she had a dream of falling off a cliff, as I understood this analogy with a cliff. It does not matter whether you have sinned a little or a lot, if you let go, you fall just as far. Since we can’t climb up, Jesus climbs down an takes us out. Because Jesus comes to us as we are, and if we accept his gift of forgiveness, when Jesus looks at us, he sees someone blameless. It I find I’m holding onto to something that God has already forgave, I remember that. I was always straining my ear to try and understand their accent, because I wasn’t used to it. But it did mean that I was paying even more attention to what she was saying. It was especially hard to understand what her husband was saying, because he was missing most of her feet. Mum and Dad said we needed to go, so we did.

We went to the swimming pool yesterday, as well as today. Both today and yesterday were very relaxing days, for the first half anyway. Nothing much happens in Mataranka. At the shred kitchen for the camping place, there is a rack with brochures, and they have thing you can do in Alice Springs Darwin, Coober Pedy, even in middle of nowhere farm. But there were on brochures for Mataranka. That doesn’t matter, we still have found some things to do. I like the camping kitchen, because you share it with others. That way you get to meet other people, and I am very social so I like that.

Today we had a very quiet morning (well you couldn’t quite say quiet.) Then we went to the market which was actually about to close. There was a book stand. I found an interesting Atlas, which was illustrated and had facts and landmarks which would be hard to research. The book was a little old, but geography doesn’t change much. I was going to buy it, but the Lady said that many people my age were so interested in technology and never spend enough time in books, so I could have it for free. If only she knew how interested I am in books. I don’t really mind though -it did come to my advantage. The books were actually old from the library, so they were trying to sell it so that they could help the library. Mum said to only let her give one away, but I didn’t think of buying the other book with the festivals around the world. I wish I did buy it, but what is done is done. and you shouldn’t look back on your mistakes, once they are forgiven and forgotten (in this case, it was not harmful, so I don’t need do either)

Then we went to this Aboriginal art gallery. I looked at them for a while, and I would have looked longer, but I was tired of standing. I like Aboriginal art, it is so detailed, intricate. Since there was also a cafe nearby, Mum ordered some scones. Dad got stuck behind because he happened to meet someone who waved at him. Then they talked for a while. Patrick stayed there, and we went to the art gallery. Patrick and Dad caught up later. The scones were very good. For some reason, Robyn decided that she didn’t like the cream, so she gave it to Mum instead.

 When we went swimming, I kept going under the water because it is actually a river, so the floor is very interesting. After a while I found a few bright green rocks. Someone said that someone lost their keys in the pool. I looked for a while, and some other people did too, but we couldn’t find them, and the person had given up. Even though there isn’t much of a current, there could have been enough to carry away the keys on the river.

We are staying in Mataranka for one more night, then tomorrow we are going to Darwin. We keep joking that the trip was too short, and I keep saying we need to quickly go to Tully for a detour. Colin Buchanan says it is a very good place in his songs, and we were listening to him a lot in the car. He makes them up faster then I can learn the words. Tully is 3 days drive form here, so it a bit to far for a detour. Besides, we did say we would get to Darwin on a certain day. That day being tomorrow. I’m trying to get my head around it, but it is quite hard to believe.

18.07.19    3500ish km

Today we travelled from Alice to Tennant Creek. The drive was still longer than others, but only half the size of the drive from Melbourne to Adelaide. On the drive, we saw lots of Termite hills. I couldn’t help wondering if they were edible. Well, I already knew they were. It made sense, because there were so many termite hills, and they had so many termites in them that they would make a good meal. I haven’t eaten them yet. Wonder what they would taste like? The termite hills were huge.

In Australia, there is this organisation working with Aboriginal people called “Gods Dreaming”. They have done lots of illustrating in Aboriginal styled painting of the big picture of the Bible. There was a picture of the Tower of Babel. Since Aboriginal people didn’t have a history of big towers, they used a termite hill instead. It makes sense. Some locals decided to put shirts on the termite hills. We thought that was funny, but there might have been something to it.

The termite hills were fascinating, because I knew how many termites lived in them, and it made them seem like cities. And then there were hundreds of cities. Some of them were probably as tall as me!

This night we are staying at a motel. It is owned by some Chinese people, and it was probably recently owned by some other people, because the hotel was called El Dorado, and at the restaurant there was a painting of a cartoon horse with the word Texas on it.

There was a swimming pool we tried to go in, because it is getting a bit warmer over here, and Mum says that Canadians would consider it a hot day. But the swimming pool was freezing, like actually freezing! I decided to jump in, because I prefer to jump in and adjust quickly than just standing there and slowly adjusting .But when I jumped in , I seriously regretted it- it was colder than usual, and a swam really quickly to the edge and pulled myself out. It didn’t go back in after that. We left, because it was too cold. The heat wasn’t that bad, after all.

17.07.19

When we went to the Uluru, at first I wanted to climb it, until I saw it. It looked pretty crazy.It had one fence which you could climb with, and it was pretty steep. I was glad we didn’t get to climb it. A lot of the way around ,the Uluru was surrounded by a fence but at one point, you could touch it. I was very happy that I could actually touch the Uluru. Some pieces of it were actually white chunks, and some patches were salt and pepper colour. It was “discouraged” to take pictures there, but there was no direct rule against it. We got a few photos.

It still bugs me that I don’t know how the Uluru got there. We have a few different theories.

1   1)  It is an asteroid from mars- My theory

2   2)  It is a giant termite nest- My theory

3   3) The aliens that built the pyramid accidentally splattered some material over here on their way to Egypt.- Mum’s theory

4   4) That God was using the rock in his creation to have an impact on the continent somehow- Dads theory

Only the fourth one was taken seriously. All the other ones were jokes because no one was quite sure how it appeared there. Strangely, the rangers didn’t talk about the geology of the mountain. They just talked about all the Aboriginal Mala peoples connection to the Uluru. Not that I wasn’t interested in the culture, I just did want to know about the geology as well.

It took about 3 hours to get there, and 3 hours to get back to the roadhouse.

The next day, we went from the roadhouse to Alice Springs. It is a very nice town, There is also lots of Aboriginal people who live here. Mum spotted out some graffiti that said “White man you surrounded”. Mum assumes this means that the Aboriginal people live on the outskirts all around Alice Springs. We went to this Anzac tower on this hill. It wasn’t that interesting. I was cold. That might have been the last time when I will be properly cold.

At night it was cold, but I didn’t feel it because I was all cosy in my sleeping bag and a nice blanket on top, as well as wearing a jumper and pyjamas. So I wasn’t cold.

Today, we have done a little exploring at two different museums. At the fist one there was this sculpture of a giant bird based off a giant bird skeleton. It looked like a giant dodo, and it was about three metres tall. I don’t think it actually looked like that in real life.

Also on a playground I met an Aboriginal girl named Kineko (I’m don’t know how to spell it) She was shy, but Robyn and I made friends with her. It started with a smile, and eventually she spoke to us, but then she needed to go.

The second museum was better, and there was lots of small sculptures. The was some of the sea floor, from a very very long time ago to present. The oldest one had fish that were very simple ,and had armour. There was also lots of animals there, and I saw an eagle. Eagles are very big (but no where near as big as the giant dodo)

The scientific names of some animals are funny. Ones scientific name sounded very complicated, but it was only a combination of Greek and Latin translating to “duck big duck” I thought that was pretty funny. One rat had the scientific name “ ratus ratus” Lots of the rocks were very pretty as well. We are still staying in Alice Springs. We have slowed down a little because we want to get a good fell of the Northern Territory.

The next morning, I decided to draw some of the plants that I saw, and the sunrise even though it wasn’t quite a sunrise because I came a bit late. Then we were in the desert. It was ridiculously empty. Sometimes we would see a few bushes, and then sometimes we would see the bush-  one bush standing by itself. What really surprised me was that it was not hot, because I thought it was always hot in the desert (except for the night), and it wasn’t quite as sandy as I expected. There was lots of small bushes and scrub called spinifex. I didn’t mind the desert, because I had a very interesting book to read.

The new went to the middle of nowhere. Well, it wasn’t exactly the middle of nowhere, because it was a tiny town in the middle of nowhere. It was called Coober Pedy, and there was lots of Opal mining there. We got to stay in an underground camping place, which Patrick and Robyn loved, but I wasn’t that excited,. It wasn’t very cosy.

Then we continued our very deserty drive the next morning-today. Mum said it looked like the type of land that of you were stuck in, you probably wouldn’t survive, unlike some places which looked better. It didn’t have enough trees. We needed to stop at any truck stop that we could see, because there was not many, and it was too risky too skip it, even if the petrol was expensive. AND THEN MY BOOK WAS FINISHED! I wish I could keep reading it, but I couldn’t. So I read another book, but this one is harder to read because of its style. Even the font was annoying. The actual story is interesting,though. We listened to Colin Buchanan music in the car because that is what you do when you are in the desert. We have a Kangaroo whistle so that we do not hit any Kangaroos. We would see signs saying to watch out for cows, because there was no fences near the road.

Today, we passed the border between South Australia and the Northern Territory. We tried to cross it all at exactly the same time, but Patrick misunderstood and stepped over the border before us. We pretended it didn’t happen and all went at the same time. I went back and forth across the border just for the sake of it and I lost count of how many times I did. After driving for I while, I saw less spinifex and a little more yellowish grey grass and bushes. There is a little less desert now, but we have still got another day of desert to go. And then we go to the Uluru. (the Ooolooroo)