Day 143 - Saturday 20 May - Darwin City

Day 143

Saturday

20 May 2017

Darwin

Awake at 7 this morning, not because of an alarm, just too sweaty to stay in bed any longer. I took my book outside and read as I attempted to load photos one .., at … a … time. It was somewhat cooler outdoors than in the stuffy van. Paul however persevered laying on the bed, hoping to gain at least a little of his lost shuteye, it didn’t happen.

He went off for a shower while I sorted breakfast and read up on things to do around Darwin. By 10am we were ready, driving into the city centre and finding a place to park. We followed Smith Street, the main drag, into the pedestrian mall and then on to the Info centre. After browsing the pamphlets, we sought info from the attendant and then returned to the streets.

 We wandered up Mitchell Street, the main food street, eyeing the lunch specials at the various eateries and then passed by Six Tanks Brewery. Knowing where this was located, we then moved the car from our two hour park to another spot and returned to the brewery. We were informed that the man to talk to wasn’t in for another 30min so we decided to do some further walking, this time along the esplanade and down to Lameroo Beach.

The path to the beach was through a thick forest of trees, their roots exposed and clinging to the rock walls. It reminded me of Cambodia only the trees weren’t engulfing ancient temples. The path ended at a viewing platform where we could take in the water of the harbour, all aqua greens and marine blues. The water looked so inviting, if it weren’t for the crocs, sharks, box jellies. What a waste.

We wandered back up the path and into Bicentennial Park, I took a liking to the trees and the string like roots that were hanging from branches above. We walked past the cenotaph before returning to Six Tanks where Paul tried the five beers they had on tap.

We crossed the road to Monsoon and had a $15 lunch meal and drink. I sat there thinking I could be in Bali. The weather, the plants, the Aussies, I was really starting to feel like I was on holiday.

We enjoyed our lunch and then moved the car down to the waterfront. We took a driverless bus from the start of the wharf to the eateries. It was a bit weird being in a vehicle with no driver, but it navigated us to the bus stop with no issues. We did a wander around the wharf marvelling at the large fish we could see coming to the surface to eat hot chips that someone was throwing in. Paul said he had never seen such large mullet and the gardie we saw was easily over a metre in length. We stood mesmerised for a while before moving on.

I collected pamphlets for harbour dinner cruises, checking out what they all had on offer, all the while Paul kept his eye on the water and on the fishermen. We continued on to the Waterfront Lagoon where large floating pool toys were set up. We watched the Americans on shore leave injure themselves doing silly things. 

The waterfront lagoon offers a safe place for people to swim. There are also lots of eateries and a wave pool, where plenty of people were taking advantage of the boogie boards and rings to bounce around over the waves. It looked like fun.

We made our way back to the car and drove out to Cullen Bay Marina where Paul is to pick up his fishing charter on Wednesday. We did a wander to the beach and then walked around the Marina admiring the houses on the water, obviously the rich part of town and the large fish that were schooling within the waters of the marina.

As I was thirsty, we stopped at Lola’s Pergola for a drink, where Paul was able to try out a beer from another Darwin craft brewery, One Mile. It was a great spot, just sitting on the deck taking it all in. It was a lovely way to spend the afternoon.

Instead of heading straight home, we stopped in at Harvey Norman to see what they had on offer in regards to portable air cons, there wasn’t really anything there to suit our needs, so we drove to Bunnings and picked up a cheap pedestal fan before returning the hot and stuffy van.

I threw open the windows in an attempt to begin the cooling process and once Paul had the fan set up, we had it running full bore, it was better than nothing. I booked into the park for an extra night and then came back and booked us into the Sail Darwin champagne and dinner sunset cruise for Monday evening. 

I went through the photos from today and then organised our dinner. Once that was out of the way we put on our bathers and headed for the pool. I spoke to Sharon as I wandered around in the cool. I like coming to the pool later as we always seem to have it to ourselves.

When we had had enough we returned to the van, Paul was happy to lay out on the bed reading while I spoke to Rebecca before adding to the blog, by 9.30pm I was ready to join him.