David's 18th

We celebrated David's 18th with lots of pizza!  Was just a nice night at home with family and a few of Davey's mates.   We had the party on Saturday 22nd but his birthday was actually the Monday.

Big waves at Nightcliff

We had a fun time down at Nightcliff jetty with a huge tide with a big monsoon swell.   Aunty Kris is up and

Baggsy shouldn't have bothered with the umbrella

came along with Aunty Shirley also.   We went back the following night also.

Shirley, Gwenny and Kristine

Hmm don't buy this car in a few years

Paul rushing to get his camera safe before the wave hits

Expedition to Orchard Creek

A bunch of us went eventually found Orchard Creek this saturday.  Was a very nice little swimming hole and a fun drive.

A few of us even got bogged - as you can see from the video here

Paul's pancreatitis

Paul had to go to accident and emergency in a lot of stomach pain Monday night.   They put him on morphine for a bit so it was all very exciting! :(

It ended up being Pancreatitis but they did not find out what caused it - even with subsequent scans and tests etc - everything seemed good inside which is good news.

After spending the night in accident and emergency he was transferred to the private hospital we he had his own room in the maternity ward of all places.   He had to stay for a few days to be monitored and got out on the thursday morning.

4wding around Scotts Creek

This sunday afternoon a few of us were a bit bored so went for a drive down to Scotts Creek.   We had

nibbles at one of the Billabongs.

The actual creek was quite flooded but we found a way over the crossing even though the ends had big wash outs in them.

Daniel got bogged on the way out when he went to test out his Sukuki on a side track with a large boggy hole.  His winch didn't work so the defender pulled him out from behind.

Paul and Gwenny were reminded of the dangers of having the windows down (no aircon in the defender) when a car driving the other way through the mud and water blasted them in their cab.

From memory those who came were Rob & Jessie, Daniel, Ree-ann, Jack, Rowen, Lee and Susy and the kids, Peter Pattemore and friends, and I can't remember who else!

Steve and Leoryah's wedding

We celebrated the wedding of Stephen Ezzy to Leoryah today at the Community Church in Millner.  Jessie and Tanya helped me with photos (http://wildfoto.smugmug.com/Weddings) but it was very wet!  We tried a few places such as Nightcliff and the old Post Office in the city and got a few keepers.

Off to Newcastle and then Adelaide

Flew out today to Newcastle where we'll pickup this 2003 Landrover Defender 130 Ute that Paul has bought.

Plan is to drive it to Adelaide to see Amber (and Craig and Lynn!) and then up the centre back to Darwin.  Our nephew Lee Harley also has bought a camper trailer in Adelaide that we said we'd tow back for him - hopefully the old truck is a good one then!

The guy with the landrover kindly picked us up in our new car and left us with it.  We then drove to Gwenny's cousins Dennis and Heather who kindly put us up for the saturday night.

We started our drive early Sunday morning and met up with Baggsy and Robby and Jessie who we travelled with for a while and had lunch together.   They were on their way down to Jessie's niece's engagement party from memory.

We stayed at ?? Sunday night on the way and arrived in Adelaide early afternoon on Monday the the 30th of December.  Mum and Dad had a spare room in their accomodation in the city so we stayed with them, and Nadine and Troy.

Was good to catch up with everyone including Craig and Lynn but unfortunately Paul couldn't visit Amber as she was in the premmy ward and he had the flu pretty bad!

Gwenny got to go a couple of times and took plenty of photos etc.

On new years eve we went to watch a 20-20 match between the Adelaide Strikers and Perth scorchers which was a lot of fun.  The city was very crowded for New Years Eve celebrations and Paul and Gwenny were happy to escape the crowds and go back to the unit after the match.  The rest went to a couple of pubs and the scene was pretty crazy - the next morning they seemed think Paul and Gwenny had the right idea retiring early!

On news years day we picked up the camper trailer that Lee and Susy Harley had bought and parked it at Craigs place.  We therefore slept at Craig and Lynn's on the last night and left very early on the morning of

Thursday the 2nd of January.   We made it to Cooper Pedy that night and then to Aileron the next.  With no aircon it was very hot in the centre so we left Aileron at 1.30am to make the most of the cool night.  Was quite a good drive and we were blessed by cool overcast weather all morning from over night rain around Daly Waters and it only cleared up by the afternoon.  By that time we were in the top end and it wasn't so hot and dry.  We got home at about 7pm on Saturday the 4th.