Stats Overview
Km's Travelled: 1311
Km's Hiked: 2
No. of Campsites: 4
The Adventures
We have had our last big week of driving dirt roads for a little while and are currently enjoying all the finer things in life while we are camped in the metropolis of Darwin! It hit home how remote we have been travelling when we visited Woolies (we clearly know how to live) and realised we haven't walked into a big [normal sized] supermarket since Adelaide! It was a nice change to have everything we desired available and not being faced with empty fridges, cabinets and shelves because we didn't time our shop with the produce delivery day. Even though we are "living the dream" being on the road, it has made us realise how much we take for granted in our ordinary lives living along the highly populated east coast.
We started our week in Nhulunbuy where we made the most of our final day in Arnhem land. We visited the Town Lagoon and had a lovely walk around it spotting lots of different wildlife. Although, with the high water level along the path and the swampy feel to the lagoon, we spent most of the walk freaking out a croc was going to grab us, so it wasn't very relaxing! The highlight of our final day (and possibly the entire stay) was making it to Goanna Lagoon where we could finally have a swim to escape the heat and humidity. The water was quite shallow and crystal clear so we were able to do our croc checks before jumping in! Nhulunbuy has been one of the highlights of our trip so far and we were a bit sad to leave, mostly because we didn't want to face the Central Arnhem Road again! Thankfully, we had a fairly uneventful trip back and made it to the bitumen without any major damage done to our equipment. Although, when we arrived at our camp after our first day of driving, we discovered the corrugations on the road had unwound our caravan awning! The guy on the property we stayed on said he has seen a lot of things in his day, but we were the first awning he has seen come undone by the road! Fortunately no damage was done, so were able to have a good laugh about it!
After making it back to the wonderfully wide, bitumen of the Stuart Highway we made a quick pit stop in Katherine where we washed about a tonne of dirt off the car and caravan, before making our way to Darwin. We decided to skip exploring Katherine and push through to Darwin because we have to go back to Katherine in order to head across to Western Australia, so we will see it then! We have had a busy few days in Darwin so far with notable mentions going to the Aviation Museum, the WWII Underground Oil Storage Tunnels and the Museum and Gallery of the Northern Territory. The Aviation Museum had a lot of different bomber aircraft on display with Will particularly infatuated with the B-52 Bomber which wingspan took up the entirety of the hangar the museum was housed in! This museum also had lots of information on the bombings of Darwin and other WWII related information. We didn't realise that Darwin was hit with more bombs than Pearl Harbour and that the region was attacked by a total of 64 air-raids during WWII. Apparently the reporting of the events in Darwin was downplayed so as not to cause fear and mass hysteria throughout the rest of the country! The Aviation Museum also has the wreckage of the plane belonging to the first Japanese POW captured in Australia. We have just finished listening to his story - so we were pretty stoked to actually see his plane. We found it pretty ironic that we were in a museum about Australia's Airforce and we were most excited to see a plane belonging to the Japanese!
We are planning to spend a few more days here in Darwin and are then going to slowly start exploring some of the sights in the nearby vicinity. We are planning to milk this area of the NT for all it is worth so we can enjoy as much of its warmth and sunshine as possible!
Kodak Moments
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| The size of the termite mounds are insane! - East Arnhem Land |
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| The best swim we have had in a while - Goanna Lagoon |
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| Enjoying the view from the treetops - Nhulunbuy |
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| Trying to escape the burning sunshine in the paperbark forest - Nhulunbuy |
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| How pretty are the croc-infested waters of the Town Lagoon? - Nhulunbuy |
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| Never ending work of deflating/inflating the tyres to drive the dirt roads - Central Arnhem |
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| Enjoyed a quick swim in the plunge pool and cannot wait to go back and explore it further - Edith Falls |
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| Sunset from our campsite - Edith River |
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| Found the Big Boxing Croc - Humpty Doo |
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| Exploring the WWII Underground Oil Storage Tunnels - Darwin |
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| Will in museum heaven with the B-52 Bomber - Darwin |
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| The water here is so blue and inviting - Darwin |
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