It's getting very hot up here...

Another 2 weeks in Kununurra have disappeared and the weather is heating up. Apparently we are now starting to experience "build up" or the lead in to the wet season. This means that we are not beginning to average 39C each day and the humidity is on the rise. Poor Dave is sweltering at work while the girls and I are relatively lucky to be able to spend so much time in airconditioned comfort.We are all very grateful that the air conditioner in the van works really well and that we have a lovely pool nearby to pop in for a swim or 2 throughout the day.

As we get nearer to the end of our time here, we have been checking back over our list of things we wanted to do while in town and have begun making sure we start crossing off the last few items. Thus, last Saturday we found ourselves back on the banks of the Ord hunting for pretty stones and hoping for some amethyst. During the week we had been re-inspired by the stones as we met a couple in the park who collected old glass and nice stones and turned them into jewellery and sun catchers while he also used old beef bones to make carvings. The girls and I each bought a carving from them (Charli a turtle, Elly a seahorse and myself a gecko), Elly also bought another necklace and they kindly made a beautiful stone that Dave found into a necklace for me, and we had told them about the location of these beautiful stones. We were there for about an hour and a half before we were happy that we had collected an interesting sample to clean up.

From here we headed back to town via the Hoochery so we could try some rum cake, well Dave and I enjoyed the cake (chocolate for him and GF spiced pumpkin for me) as the girls found the flavour too strong and opted to just enjoy their iced chocolate instead.

That night we decided to set ourselves up outside for a family movie and introduced the girls to The 3 Musketeers. As usual they balked at our movie suggestion to begin with but always wind up enjoying the suggested movie in the end.

We ended up scoring an invitiation on Saturday evening to join another few families on a visit to Spring Creek on Sunday. We had begun the drive into the creek weeks ago and never got to the end and it has been on our to do list ever since so we jumped at the opportunity. We met at Ivanhoe crossing driving over the river and headed towards the turn off. It was a fun little drive in (seems we had made it about 1/3 of the way in last time) finding ourselves a short walk out from a small but very clear pool with a lovely waterfall. Dave took the girls adventuring up the waterfall with some of the other men and bigger kids in the group. When they returned we heard about the really deep, cavernous pool at the top of this section of the falls. I then had to venture up myself for a look too even though I was a little nervous about how I was going to get back down. You can make your way further up the falls again so we are keen to revisit if we get the chance and explore a bit further.

What we have discovered is, that this is the perfect time to explore by car as we get to spend most of our time in air conditioned comfort, and even better when you find a good swimming spot at the end.

This week the girls made some new friends in the pool as a new family arrived in the park who were moving from Esperence to Kununurra for work. They have 2 boys and the younger one happens to now be in Charli's class at school. They have really hit it off so we are in the pool with them each afternoon after school. On Friday night we got together for drinks and had a great night - Blanche is a fellow early childhood teacher and also an outlander fan so we got along really well and probably consumed a little too much wine!

Next morning we had to go to the markets as it was the last one of the season and had to make sure we had tried out anything we had our eye on - mainly that the kids wanted to try food from the very popular thai van. Elly almost missed out on some of the red curry but the lovely lady gave her the end of the batch which was mostly sauce with rice and didn't even charge us for it so she was rapt in the end.

That afternoon the girls decided to do fathers day a little early so we could take Dave out for dinner as the pub was going to e closed on Sunday. It was nice to have a meal out and the girls get a real kick out of it and spoiling their dad. Oh and mango pina coladas are delicious.

Sunday called for a clean up and a swim, some homework and a drive around town. Late afternoon we popped out to Mirima NP to do the other walking tracks we didn't get too weeks ago. The kids found out about some local plants and we enjoyed the last of the sunset from the top of the rocks.

Update on change of van: Still waiting patiently for our new van to be ready. Lots of interest in the Jayco although mostly in Perth so we are looking at our best plan of attack from here...