DAY 33 FROM SOUTH TO NORTH - TOP END (NORTHERN TERRITORY) TRIP

27 May 2010

MALDON DAM - DARWIN

What a night! Cacophony of insect noises, frogs croaking, pidgeons at sunset, barking owl at night and other indistinguishable noises, the numerous road trains roaring past, and several trains passing just overhead of us whilst we lay in bed soaking in perspiration. This is not the dry season we expected.

Late at night another vehicle pulled in close to us. We did hope that we didn’t wake them when we left in the morning. Along the way there were several remains of airstrips form WW2 along the Stuart Highway – a grim reminder of how close to home WW2 really was.

Before we knew it we were in Darwin. First impressions were of a lovely, clean, tidy sprawling metropolis. I was not expecting it to be as big as it is.

We were looking for the big ‚i‘ as we drove in. Very disappointing as besides an‚i‘ near Palmerston leading to a billboard there were no further indications where to find the visitor’s centre. We finally did find it in town but it was nowhere near as good as the one in Katherine. The cues were big and they did not have enough staff on. There were six ‚service‘ areas but they were not all being manned. Anyway after getting information on campsites and picking up a stack of brochures as one does when travelling we headed for Shady Glen Caravan Park as it was on a bus route. This was in case we couldn’t use the Oka. Darwin had had a downpour today and everything was wet, muddy and it was really, really, really humid.  After settling in we decided to head out to Mindil sunset markets.

The markets are held in a beautiful setting on the shores of Mindil Beach. There was a great atmosphere, lots of stalls and lots of people. We were a little disappointed at the lack of variety amongst the food stalls. Due to Darwin being such a cultural mix of peoples were expected respresentation of more cultures in the foold stalls. The Raw Didge performer was just amazing!

Closer to sunset more and more people were making their way down to the beach. Food in hand they sat on the dunes or walked to the waters edge and watched the sun sink lower and lower on the horizon.

Boats rocked peacefully in the distance.

It was a lovely sunset.