The thermal pool at Mataranka Homestead

Mataranka (including the Never-Never)
Small township and a large resort near the Stuart Highway in the famous 'never-never'.
Mataranka is located on the Stuart Highway 1059 km north of Alice Springs, 423 km south of Darwin and 107 km south of Katherine. It was once unkindly described by the writer Sumner Locke Elliott as 'this lonely strip of barren and seemingly endless sandy waste of ant-hills and stunted trees - thick, hot red sand in the winter time and a sea of mud during the dreaded 'Wet''.

It is fair to wonder whether Elliott was aware of the area's one great attraction when he wrote so disparagingly of the town. 10 km to the east of the town, which, in fairness, is nothing more than a couple of roadhouses and a pub on the Stuart Highway, there is a small, 4 hectare park with a superb thermal pool and stands of cabbage tree palms and paperbarks. Owned and operated as the Mataranka Homestead Tourist Resort this is a popular stopover and picnic spot for visitors to the area.

Perhaps even more importantly (and again Elliott's description ignores this literary interest) the town was near the site of Elsey Station, the subject of Jeannie Gunn's enormously popular autobiographical novel We of the Never-Never.

Things to see:  

Grave of Aeneas James Gunn and the memorial to Jeannie Gunn. He died on 16/3/1903 at 41 and she died on 9/6/1961 at the age of 91 years

Elsey Cemetery and National Reserve
A sign on the Stuart Highway 10 km south of the town points to the Elsey Cemetery and National Reserve which is located 5 km to the east.

The cemetery contains the remains of Aeneas James Gunn 'The Maluka' who died on 16 March 1902 of malarial dysentery only 13 months after the couple had moved to the area. The grave of Aeneas is located next to a memorial to Jeannie which reads 'In loving Memory of the 'Little Missus''. She died on 9 June 1961 having outlived her husband by nearly half a century.

The remains of some of the other characters mentioned in We of the Never-Never were relocated to the Elsey Cemetery during World War 11 when the Northern Territory force carried out work designed to develop the cemetery as a significant part of Australia's cultural heritage.

In fairness to Elliott even Mrs. Gunn was in awe of the loneliness of the area. In We of the Never-Never she described Elsey Station as 'this tiny homestead of a million and a quarter acres, with the Katherine settlement a hundred miles to the north of it, one neighbour ninety miles to the east, another, a hundred and five to the south, and others about two hundred to the west.'

Mataranka Homestead Tourist Resort
The number of travellers (originally they had read the book and now they have seen the film) wanting to discover Jeannie Gunn's 'never-never' continues to increase. Mataranka Homestead Tourist Resort has cleverly exploited the lack of historical remnants by purchasing and rebuilding the replica of Elsey Homestead which was used in the 1982 film We of the Never-Never.

The whole notion of the 'never-never' was that it was somewhere which was impossibly distant. The most extreme area of the outback. A term which was synonymous with hardship and loneliness.

The image of the 'never-never' is that evoked by Henry Lawson in his poem 'The Never-Never Land' when he writes

Where lone Mount Desolation lies,
Mounts Dreadful and Despair -
'Tis lost beneath the rainless skies
In hopeless deserts there.

	Motels
	Territory Manor Martins Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4516 Facsimile: (08) 8975 4612
	Hotels
	Old Elsey Roadside Inn Stuart Hway Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4512
	Old Elsey Wayside Inn 13 Roper Tce Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4512 Rating: *
	Resorts
	Mataranka Homestead Tourist Resort Homestead Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4544 Facsimile: (08) 8975 4580
	Cottages & Cabins
	Mataranka Cabins 4705 Martin Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4838 Facsimile: (08) 8975 4814
	Caravan Parks
	Mataranka Roadhouse Roper Tce Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4571
	Territory Manor Motel & Caravan Park Martins Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4516
	Restaurants
	Mataranka Homestead Tourist Resort Homestead Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4544 Facsimile: (08) 8975 4580
	Mataranka Roadhouse Roper Tce Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4571
	Territory Manor Motel & Caravan Park Martins Rd Mataranka NT 0852 Telephone: (08) 8975 4516