Nomading - Darwin - Part 4 - 6 - 14 July 2021

Still here in Darwin starting another week, today seemed like a good day to take a drive out to Fogg Dam Conservation Park. Robb and I have a bit of a saying in our explorations that every now and again we find a gem, and that is exactly how we would describe this wetland reserve. We have visited lots of wetlands that don't look like they have seen water for the past 400 years which means most of the local wildlife has long ago left but this was not the case here. This wetlands was exactly how you would imagine one to be with lots of billabongs and lakes and more birds than you can write home about, thousands of water birds, ducks and predators, the only thing I didn't see was a crocodile. When you first drive into the reserve there is a car park and from here there are two or three walks you can take, we didn't stop because Robb would not be able to manage the walk. When you leave the car park you drive onto a one lane road that takes you through the wetlands and ends at a lookout with two levels that looks back over the whole area. I have to say we were both very impressed, I walked back to the car to get the binoculars for Robb which I had to borrow at one time to see the many birds and flora around this spectacular area. We sat and stared at this beautiful outlook for quite awhile because there was so much to see but at the same time it was very calming. From here we drove to the Adelaide Rive Jumping Crocodile tour centre to take a look, we have not quite decided yet whether or not we want to do another crocodile tour.

We had a conversation with our son Matthew about catching up for a few days in Kununurra WA so we had contacted the repairers we were working with to see if we could have the repairs that they had the parts for taken care of and a temporary repair on the hole in the roof, they agreed and booked us in for Wednesday morning. Our plan was to leave Darwin and drive back down to Katherine and then cross the border into WA. Unfortunately in the meantime we found out that if we entered WA we would need to self isolate for 14 days which meant we still wouldn't catch up with family. We didn't want to self isolate in Kununurra when we were free to roam in Darwin so we decided to stay here and have booked for another two weeks. Matthew and Lyndal are due to a arrive in Darwin on the 18 July so we might as well wait here for them and spend what time we can together. Hopefully by then we might be able to enter WA without self isolating and if not we may travel down the centre, however, at the moment SA are not letting us in at all.

We were up very early on Wednesday morning to drop the van at the repairers, we had no idea how long the work was going to take so we didn't make much in the way of plans for the day. We drove back to our caravan less camp where we had left our table and chairs, we had all our devices with us so thought we would just sit and wait to hear when we could pick our van back up. At lunchtime we still hadn't heard so thought we might go somewhere for lunch seeing I couldn't make anything at home. We chose to go to the Howard Springs Pub as Kylie the manager at the park we are at had given us a voucher for free drinks there and also Matthew and family were planning to stay at Howard Springs Caravan park so we thought we would check it out. On our drive there Carol from the repairers phoned to say the work had been completed, we continued on to lunch and said we would pick the van up on our way home. Lunch at the pub was a bit ordinary but there was plenty of it. As normal for lunch we chose two entrees to share, today this was wedges and a buffalo burger, there was far too much and we left half of the food behind. We picked up the van and then returned to set up in our site, Kylie the manager called up to see us and we paid for the next week while she was there.

No plans for today so I spent the morning cleaning the van and doing some washing. We did have a visit from our little hen that was our main amusement through lockdown. She has come closer to us each day and now comes within a couple of feet of the van. She scrapes up all the ground cover looking for food and sometimes just makes a nest of all the cover and nestles in there for the night.

Friday we planned to visit the Mindil Beach Casino which we have passed many times and have said just as many times that we should visit here one day, so today is the day. We had our coffee at home first and arrived around 11.00am, the idea was to have a look around and bit of a flutter and then maybe have lunch here. The casino itself, like everything in Darwin, is quite small. It is a bit strange for us because we often spend time at Crown casino and we were expecting something a bit bigger but other than that it is just like any other casino although when we entered there would only have been about 50 people in all that we could see whereas at this time in Melbourne the casino would be packed. Apart from that it is very clean and there are heaps of friendly staff around keen to help. We had a look at the couple of restaurants and their menu trying to decide what to do for lunch and then walked out to the pool area which is called Infinity an and it is indeed an infinity pool and it is in a very nice setting. It was such a lovely day we thought we would prefer to return to Cullen Bay for lunch and sit looking out over the water, so we drove and parked in the street to walk and select a restaurant along the marina. We chose to stop at Yots Greek Taverna because their menu appealed to us the most and we chose to sit outside to admire the view. We chose calamari and yiros to share and once again there was far too much for us but the food was excellent and we would both highly recommend a visit here. We had another little visitor in the afternoon who decided to have a bit of a rest in the back of our car, we are not sure how he came to be in there because it is a pretty big hop from the ground.

Saturday turned out to be a much bigger day than we intended. We started off with a visit to Darwin Aviation Museum, we weren't really expecting too much from passing this museum many times in our travels into Darwin city, and I must admit both Robb and I have been to so many museums in our travels to being a bit ho hum about them but we were running out of things to do. This was our first stop for the day so we parked and walked into the centre to purchase our entry, when you enter you are directed to watch the video on the history of aviation in Darwin and then to walk around the displays. We did as directed and then proceeded with the walk through the hangar. Well didn't we feel stupid, this was one of the best museums we have ever been into, the number and variety of aircraft on display was mind boggling, you had to look carefully to see all displays but once you started you couldn't stop. The main aircraft was the B-52 bomber that took up the whole hangar so that all the other aircraft were underneath or beside this magnificent airplane. We thought we would be in and out of this museum but it was two hours before we could drag ourselves away. I have to say I don't think this attraction gets the recognition it deserves.

From here we drove to what we thought was Casuarina Coastal Reserve but unfortunately I don't think we actually reached our destination. Our GPS couldn't seem to find it so I think maybe we would need to speak to the people at the information centre to find out where to go. We turned around and then when we arrive at Howard Springs Nature Park we drove in here for a bit of a look around. We were pleasantly surprised with this park which looks like it has been designed for families, there was a party going on today in one of the huts and I think this would be a normal occurrence. We firstly walked over to the bridge over the lake and watched all the fish in the very clear water. There were lots of small fish around, the ones who were eating our toes at Berry Springs, and other bigger fish including Barramundi and as we later discovered many tortoise came up to see what was going on. There was even a sighting of a water python but I couldn't see it. The lake was closed to swimming because a crocodile had been spotted here a few weeks back. We walked from here over to the mad made swimming pools with a water fall in the background, such a great area for young families on hot days.

Our next visit was to be to Fannie Bay Gaol which according to our tourist book is only open from 10am-2pm Saturdays and we set the destination in our GPS and would get there with 8 minutes to spare, we thought it was worth the trip considering we were hoping to leave on Tuesday. We arrived at the allotted time and I jumped out of the car and let Robb take his time. I entered the gaol and met the caretaker closing it off, he obviously wasn't receptive to have it open one second longer than necessary so I ran around in front of him taking photos, it is amazing how quick I can be when I need to. However, in our short and crisp conversation with him we discovered the gaol is now open 7 days a week but we couldn't really see ourselves coming back and I had seen enough.

We drove home for a quick lunch and a bit of a rest before driving to Aquascene Fish Feeding attraction to commence at 5.00pm. The time it begins depends on what time the high tide comes in. There is an equestrian event happening at Robbie Robbins reserve so we had to find our way around the horses to get back to the van but we do have a donut van parked next to us so that might come in handy later on. We left the park at 4.30pm to drive to Aquascene and arrived just before 5.00pm, they were just opening the gates when we hopped out of the car. We paid our entry and walked down to the water where people had already started feeding the fish, there was quite a frenzy to start with which settled down a bit as time went on. This was fun but maybe not quite what we expected, there wasn't a lot of variety of fish coming in but we did see a couple of sharks. The children all really enjoyed it, I am not really sure that I would recommend it to anyone. We arrived home around 6.00pm and I immediately started preparing dinner, we were having pasta so I started on the sauce. When the sauce was ready neither of us was that hungry probably because we had a late lunch so we decided to put the sauce in the fridge and buy three donuts from the van and share these, they were large donuts and we chose a jam, a custard and a caramel donut, they were plenty for us by the time we had then, probably because it was getting a bit late by then too. I had walked over to watch the equestrian events earlier on and took a few photos. They commence the events at around 3.00pm and then continue on to around 9.30pm, the evenings are quite balmy and it is very pleasant outside watching this competition on the hill.

We went in search of Knuckey Lagoon this morning, someone had told us to take a look at it soon after we arrived in Darwin. It was a little difficult to find but we did, it is a very pretty area with lots of water lillies and there were a mixed variety of water birds resting either in the water or on the grass. From here we drove to take a look at East Arm Wharf which I didn't realise until we arrived is the port in Darwin that is leased to the Chinese. Unfortunately we were not allowed to access the wharf itself so we drove from here to the WW11 Quarantine Anti Aircraft Battery site which is just down the road. The Quarantine site is in ruins with just parts of the buildings still standing and is the only complete gun site of it's type in Darwin. It was quite interesting to see and wander around, there was one plotting room under ground but the stairs looked a bit to scary to walk down so I just had a peak from the top. We drove from here to the Darwin Trailer and Boat Club for a quick beer before returning home for lunch. We have decided this is our new favourite spot on the water for drinks and meals and we will return tomorrow for lunch.

Lots has happened in the last few days, I heard from my friend in WA that the border is now open to people from the NT without 14 days quarantine which meant we could make plans for moving on. First of all I checked the information to make sure it is correct, not that I didn't trust my friend but I just wanted to see what restrictions were still in place. All we need to do is complete the Entry Pass and have a health check at the border which is fine with us. Robb and I discussed how we were going to proceed from here yesterday and this morning we started putting actions in place. I phoned the caravan repairer and asked if they did receive the part today to let us know and we will adjust our plans, they still hadn't received the part and it is now nearly 5.00pm so we won't hear from them today. When I finished my call with them Robb called our son Matthew to see what date they were going to be in Katherine, we have been trying to catch up with them but all our plans have been upset with Covid and this is the last chance we may have to catch up. They will arrive in Katherine on Thursday and we will be going back down to Katherine before heading across to the West, we will organise to stay where we are for an extra night and then drive down to Katherine where we have booked in at Manbulloo for three nights, they are also staying here and they will be staying five nights but they will have things to do that we have already done we may as well move on after a quick catch up with them, if we want to extend our stay I am pretty sure we will be able to organise the extra time. In the meantime I had stripped the bed and washed the bedding and hung it out to dry and then put a clothes wash on before driving to the Karama Shopping Centre to pick up the few items we needed which as normal turned out more than we first thought. When we returned from shopping the bedding was dry so I made up the bed and hung out the other wash before putting the shopping away. Finally now we can drive to the Darwin Trailer Boat Club for lunch. This club had been recommended to us by the driver of the HoHo bus and we were a bit reluctant to go here because it doesn't look much from East Point Road. We called in here yesterday for a beer and we were very pleasantly surprised with this club, I mentioned above it is my new favourite on the water eating area. So today we are back for lunch and after lunch today it is definitely our favourite eating place on the water in Darwin. Robb had a fantastic steak that was well cooked and accompanied with chips and two sauces a mustard sauce and creamy garlic sauce. I had the club signature dish Bun Thit Nuon which is Lemongrass Pork Skewers with Asian salad and Vietnamese dressing and it was delicious, it looked small when it came out but there was more than enough for me, we had a beer each and all up it was a great lunch. On the way home we stopped off at a florist in Parap Village to buy flowers for our amazing caretaker at our park, she has put up with us changing our mind with moving or staying with the Covid restrictions and has always had a smile on her face. We will come back here because we love Darwin but this has also been an excellent stop.

Here we are with our last night in Darwin and I must admit to mixed feelings about moving on. On one hand I am pretty excited to have the freedom to decide where we go next but on the other hand I have loved this pretty small city and in some ways will be sorry to leave, maybe I am suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. Yesterday we checked with the caravan repairer that our part had still not arrived, if it had we would have stayed longer to have the permanent repairs taken care of, but it still hadn't turned up and we are starting to think it never will. Next we contacted the lovely Kylie our park caretaker to tell her we would be moving on but we needed to stay one more night, we paid for that night and also presented her with flowers we had purchased through the day to show our appreciation for everything she had done for us including putting up with our ever changing dates and just the fact that she had said she was never going to kick us out, it gave us a feeling of security in these strange times. We will return here next time in Darwin. There wasn't much more to do then other than fill the car up with fuel and pick up the last few items we needed for today. We have spent the remainder of the day hooking the van up and packing away the items we can for today and then sitting back and relaxing which for me meant catching up with my blog and chasing up our movements for the next week or so. We are looking forward to catching up with family in the next couple of days and then hopefully finally moving in to Western Australia. We have had a few challenges along the way but I cannot say I am sorry we started this trip and I would probably say to anyone interested in my thoughts, don't wait for everything to settle down because this is our normal now. I have added a few photos here, one from each week of our stay.