‘I traded my home in Cheshire for a life in outback Australia’ | Manchester News

When Emma Palmer told her parents she had fallen in love with an Aussie bloke called Whippy while backpacking through the outback, they initially thought he was an ice-cream salesman.

Nathan “Whippy” Griggs is actually a professional whip cracker, entertainer, Guinness World record holder and a local celebrity in Australia’s Northern Territory.

After leaving her home village of Tattenhall, near Chester, for an adventure 9,000 miles (14,500km) away, Emma met Nathan in the tiny town of Mataranka, about 260 miles south of the capital Darwin.

Six years later, with the couple expecting their first baby, Emma has permanently traded the green hills of Cheshire for the red dirt of the outback.

“It’s still a bit bizarre,” she said. “I’m like ‘how did I end up here?'”

Although she never expected to settle in a place where the year-round temperature hovers about 30C, and is an hour’s drive away from the nearest supermarket, the 27-year-old said she would not change a thing.

“Back home [compared to] what it’s like living out here – it’s just so, so, so different,” Emma explained.

“You just can’t even comprehend how different it is and how wonderful it is.”

Emma and Nathan are now among the 380 permanent residents of Mataranka, which also has a regular flow of tourists because of its natural thermal hot springs (except when they are closed because of crocodile sightings).

Initially a tourist, Emma got a job at the local homestead.

While working there, she met Nathan the whipcracker.

His show involves cracking a stock whip to the tune of popular songs, and performing risky tricks involving fire and daring audience members.

While he was a local celebrity – often getting mobbed at the homestead’s bar – Emma saw through his performer persona.

She recalled: “I would spot him from a mile away and be like ‘look, it’s Nathan “Whippy” Griggs’ and all the tourists would turn around and be, like, ‘where?’.

“I just thought it was really funny.”

Nathan added: “She definitely wasn’t fangirling over me…”

Although the practice is traditionally used to manage livestock, Nathan said he had always seen whipcracking as a form of art.

“It’s nothing to do with cattle or what most people would expect,” he said.

“It revolves around entertainment.”

Originally from Western Australia, the 32-year-old said he got into whipcracking aged 14 after he saw someone do it for the first time while travelling through the state’s north with his family.

He said: “I saw a bloke crack a whip and he let me have a go and showed me how to crack this stock whip and then after that I went out and bought a whip from a bloke up in Darwin.

“I got hooked on the whipcracking and I just focused all my energy into doing that.”

Before long, Nathan had two Guiness World Records under his belt to “boost his profile”, alongside his growing social media following.

One is for cracking the longest whip, which he made himself to be 100.47m (328ft) long, while the other is for the most stock whip cracks in one minute – a whopping 359.

“When I focus on something, I have to be the best at it,” Nathan explained.

After they got together, Emma became Nathan’s manager and the couple moved away from the homestead and into their own property nearby.

They have dogs, a donkey and nine horses – something which delights lifelong horse lover Emma.

Now they’re counting down the days until the birth of their first baby, who will join them on a three-month tour of Nathan’s show to pubs and local sports grounds across Australia.

“I think [we feel] probably how any first-time parents feel – we’re equal parts excited, equal parts like ‘what the hell is about to happen?’,” said Emma.

Although they come from such different backgrounds, the couple have bonded over their shared love of their lifestyle, spending their spare time fishing and enjoying the outdoors.

Emma said: “People say ‘what do you do? There’s nothing there…’

“I say: ‘There’s nothing there, but there’s everything there’ – it’s so beautiful.

“If you love the outdoors and you like to be outside, then it’s the perfect place because it’s hot and hotter. It’s never cold!”