Thursday, July 12, 2007
Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia
Where to start the last two days.. lets see.. I hop off my flight from Singapore to Darwin at 4:30am, after being interogated, sniffed by dogs and searched for food that I told them I had, I finally make it through customs.
Again, relying on the help of the tourist office I take the first bed they can find for me as they tell me the town is jammed due to the end of a festival.. later I found out how right they were! After a phone call or two back home to hear a friendly voice, I finally get my tour arranged. The woman was not going to help me narrow down but finally relented and gave me choices between the city tour (BORING!), Litchfield Park (low key, swiming, aboriginal history) and Catherine Gorge, I finally chose Catherine Gorge…sounds pretty right 🙂
The only catch.. I have 10 minutes to take a taxi to a gas station on the outskirts of town and flag down the tour bus as it drives by … nothing like fun! As I finally walk up the stairs of the monster motor coach, I’m a bit dissapointed. It appears that I’m the youngest person on the tour by 20 years.. Oh well. Its still dark so I catch some shuteye, remember.. I haven’t been in a bed now for over 24 hours. Dozing in and out we stop for breakfast at the place that has the buffalo that Croc Dundee hypnotized in the movie. Take a small visit to the War Memorial to the soliders from WWII and then finally stop at Edith Falls.
The falls are small, the water is cold, but I’m in sore need of a shower.. haven’t had one of those in 24 hours either. So into the drink I go.. WITH my new camera… but wait.. Its all OK, its waterproof to 33 feet and it worked like a dream.
Once out of the falls, back on the bus and down to the george for a lunch cruise up two segments of the george. I finally get a couple that was sitting in front of me to talk and it turns out that they are about my age so that was nice.
The Catherine George. Was quite stunning, a little brother to the Grand Canyon I’d say, but nice in the fact that the river is accessible and you could have lunch on it while cruising and having a beer.. yes beer.. I know surprise! Beautiful sandstone georges and even some aboriginal artwork on the walls. Weather was stunning 80 degrees and sunny. Couldn’t ask for anything nicer!
The bus ride home was brutally long with a stop for “Barra and Chips”, thats Barramundi fish and chips. Tasted a lot like Cod to me. Finally getting back into Darwin at 8:30pm I had to walk about 1/2 mile to my bed.. the Youth Shack. A JAMMED full, NOISY, DIRTY and HOT youth hostel with expensive internet prices .. which is why no blog yesterday.
Finally I get showered up, into bed and pass out for about 5 hours before 4:45am rolls around and I have to head back to the airport to discover my next fun fact. My flight from Darwin to Sydney via Cairns (pronounced Cans) actually had one more stopover in Gove, Australia.. I don’t even know where that was other than it looked to be absolutely in the middle of nowhere.
I’m now sitting in the Cairns airport and from the looks of what I see, I’m really going to enjoy spending two days here on my route back to Thailand. I’m excited to dive the Barrier reef.
Tonight and tomorrow I’ll be in Sydney.. I’m running out of time on this internet connection thing again.. you have to pay for everything. I’ll try and get some more money on this thing and post some pictures since I have time to kill in the airport.
TODAYS LEARNED FACT: The uranium mine in the Nothern Territories of Australia is the largest producer of uranium in the world.
This is a new feature of my blog.. I’ll try and post a new and hopefully interesting fact I learn each day.
Cheers Mate!
Bill
