What do you call a tour guide that hasn’t yet qualified to guide in the National Parks?
Answer: A bus driver.
In the Vortex, an “adventure tour” to Darwin is a bus trip with scenic rest stops. Half the group consisted of a family from the UK, traveling in Australia, getting in touch with their roots: the parents, Fiona and Ian; two charming daughters, Carita and Rox; Rox's friend, Max (also charming); and brother -- ‘mad-dog’—David (less charming).
My first thought: “great, I’m traveling with the Brady Bunch.” But they turned out to be a good bunch, although ‘mad dog’ did almost get me killed in Katharine Gorge. – I think I promised not to tell. Don’t remember much of the rest of the group except for Randal, an artist that was working through a dry spell. Randal was soon to experience a life altering epiphany. For the moment he was a good drinking buddy.
The second stop on our adventure (the first was a rock marking where a telegraph station used to be) was Elliot, just a few sun-bleached wooden houses clustered near the road, plus a petrol station with a bathroom. Elliot's the place with the most UFO sightings in OZ and to commemorate it, there is a tin space ship and 2 green papier-mâché extraterrestrials in front of the petrol station shop. Thank goodness it’s not as overrun as Roswell Arizona.
We stopped for lunch at the Devils Marbles. 
The next leg of our adventure was a tour of a "working gold mine", run by mining enthusiasts – similar to train spotters in the UK in that they are nice, well-meaning people, but the object of their passion has limited interest to the population at large.
The tour was ideal for the families traveling with 7 year olds; unfortunately, we had none with us. We obediently put on our hard hats and ear protection, and trudged to the mine. The woman giving the tour was enthusiastic to a fault. I liked her, but I'm attracted to the fringe.
She explained the working hierarchy in the mine, noisily demonstrated tools, and of course insisted on audience participation. For the explosives demonstration she recruited mad-dog Brady. She explained how the charges were set and fired, and how sometimes not all the charges went off. Ha Ha, then it was the job of the explosive guy to investigate.
He is the highest paid in the team after all. She held up some dynamite and said she thought dynamite had a sense of humor, and that she always imagined it went something like this; “hee he, he hee ha..."
Everyone smiled, "hee HEE, ha HAA Haa ha..."
We still smiled.
“Hee, he he Haa ha…” Some stopped smiling.
"Haw HAW Hee, haa hee", people began to back down the mine shaft.
"Ha hee ha ah.." she paused, then smiled and then quietly said,
"boom."
She looked pleased, mistaking everyone’s look of relief as success of her joke.
Daly Waters
The Daly Waters pub is famous as the first International Airport in the Outback. It has an eclectic décor, and when we arrived they were in the process of dusting the panties hanging from the rafters. 
The bar is open all around and shaded, so a very comfortable place to have a beer. It is well known so collects a diverse set of clientele and can get busy. Further up the road is another Pub in the middle of nowhere, the Adelaide River Club 303. It is not as well known as Daly Waters, but it’s “nowhere” is much more extensive. I highly recommend it.
Outside Katherine Gorge is the town of Katharine, and just outside of town is a defunct rail bridge where I experienced one of the more memorable sights. The bridge spans the Katharine River. Standing on it you can see upriver about 100 yards, and down river quite a way farther. When you look upstream, just as the sun goes down, you can make out movement at the bend, as if all the trees are quivering.
Within minutes it's clear that this movement is from bats, lots of bats, thousands of bats, probably tens of thousands of bats, screeching and bickering. The air is filled with bats as far as you can see, all the way up and down the river and all around the bridge. Sometimes they collided. So many they block the twilight, and so close to you that you can smell them.
These were flying foxes, fruit eaters out looking for a meal. These were huge creatures with 2 ft wingspans. Maybe this is why they call this place OZ because it sure looked like the flying monkeys the Wicked Witch of the West sent off.
Katharine Gorge is gorgeous (sorry), and well worth the trip to Darwin. Given enough time you can take canoes up through a series of gorges, carrying the canoe over the rocks in between, and stay overnight. We had time to get into the second gorge. Getting back was, well, lets just say; never listen to a 19 year old “mad-dog.”
From Katharine Gorge we went to Darwin. I had another end of trip “free” meal at the “world famous” Vics, followed by more force-fed fun from an MC. Used to be if you had a drink or two too many and started dancing on the table, it didn’t take too long before you were getting thrown out. At Vics, however, you had to get up on the table, whether you wanted to or not. I didn’t and I went back to the hostel bar, had a pint and checked out the four, very smart, 6 ft plus, cross dressers. The effect somewhat spoiled by chest hair visible in the low cut gowns.
