What a funny little town Mataranka is!
Adorned with life-size clay sculptured early pioneers, strangely posed throughout the neighbourhood and I guess the community’s endeavour to associate itself with the folklore novel We of the Never Never.
A broken-down pub, a service station famed for its meat pies, art gallery and coffee shop with newly minted signage which is now closed and currently for sale. The supermarket has fresh bread each day but one must wait for the arrival of ‘the truck’ —-mostly in the late afternoon!
But!
In the land of the never never lie hidden aquatic jewels in a setting of lush palm, bullrushes and paper bark trees. And today I learned these freshest of warm water pools come from the Barkly Tablelands 500 km away, which in turn comes from the Gregory River in Queensland. Flowing all the way through an underground limestone aquifer, geologically covered by non porous Basalt rock. Fractures in the earth’s crust allow the limestone to surface and bestow Mataranka with the most dazzlingly beautiful crystal pools.
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