Living in Darwin
Darwin – November 2006 to October 2007
We arrived in Darwin and decided to stay for a few weeks to restock funds, our friend Sarah was living there so we could tie it in with visiting her as well as house sitting for her over Xmas. When Sarah left to take up a new job in Queensland in September we were still here, a few weeks turned out to be 50! Darwin seems to do that to people and a lot of 20 year residents came for a few weeks only!
We both loved our time in Darwin finding the lifestyle laid back atmosphere and climate very addictive. It’s hard to sum up a whole year without leaving anything out but real highlights include the markets Parap Saturday morning, great smoothies and Thai beef salad, MIndil of course and Nightcliff on Sunday morning as well as Rapid Creek for veggies. It was wonderful being able to go away for weekends so easily we enjoyed camping at Litchfield particularly Buley rock pools and Wangi , as well as Kakadu, Dundee (thanks Keith and Terina!) and Crab Claw Island. The Adelaide River jumping crocodiles were interesting I got to feed one, thankfully on the end of a long pole, (not a natural I nearly dropped the pole!) We also enjoyed the Yellow Waters tour on Alligator River in Kakadu. Though we saw plenty of crocs on both those occasions thankfully the only ones we got up close with were at Crocodylus Park very interesting and informative.
The Adelaide River Races where we camped amongst 1000’s of other Utes was great fun as was lady’s day for the Darwin Cup- the later being marginally more civilized!!! We also got to the Litchfield Pub Rodeo for new years eve.. a whole lot of very muddy fun!
The deckchair cinema was a fabulous venue, as was Stoke Hill Wharf where we had many Al Fresco meals. After work it was unreal to take a walk or cycle round Nightcliff or the Esplanade foreshore prior to just watching the sunset with a cold beer.
On the subject of work we were both really lucky I had work both at the NT Police and the University both jobs were great fun and I met some lovely people which made the time fly by. Andrew similarly found there was no shortage of shipwright work and worked for some great clients. All of this helped make our Darwin stay the pleasure it was. We were both sorry to leave (and I know some of you thought we never would –Helen and John!) - but we will definitely be back.
Left to Right: 1) Crocodile 2) Sunset over Cullen Bay