Day 38

Deirdre had given me the name of a friend in Darwin who owned a travel agency in the Mall, so I made this my target for the morning. David was whizzing around the place on his scooter, the novelty value of which had not yet worn off, and John had decided to hire a moped and explore a bit further out of town.

Day 37

For our first full day in Darwin, we split up to explore our various interests. David headed off to hire a bike, but with the temperature already heading for the hotter side of 30º, and humidity so high I felt I was walking through a bowl of soup, I was definitely not in any shape to handle such strenuous excesses. While John chose the powered option and hired a 50cc buggy, I decided to check out the Aviation museum.

Day 36

Taking a flight in a hot air balloon had been on my list of things to do for a long time, and we were finally going for a flight. In fact, this was to prove quite a busy day for flying, since we were scheduled to take the more conventional form of air transport to Darwin later in the day.

Day 35

Another late start allowed us a lie-in. John and David decided to hire bikes and ride “to the middle of nowhere and back again”. But with a guidebook full of places to go, I decided to visit the Old Ghan Train Museum.

Day 34

After the previous day’s long coach journey, it was a relief not to have to get up early. The problem with this, or course, is that all the good restaurants and cafes have stopped serving breakfast. Fortunately, after a brief wander down the Todd Mall, I found an excellent café that served breakfast all day.

Day 33

This day was never going to start well. At precisely 4am, all the alarms I had set began to go off, which had absolutely no effect on me but brought David and John to startled awakeness, and I was subsequently aroused by a bottle of shower gel on a ballistic trajectory from David’s bunk. After stumbling through packing, attempting to be as quiet as possible and failing, I found myself in front of the reception area at quarter to five, feeling very sorry for myself. My mood was brightened moments later when I found out that there was someone having a worse morning than me. Her name was Tammy, and her backpack had broken while packing that morning.

Day 32

The big moment had finally arrived, and there was no avoiding it – I was going to have to climb the damned thing. We caught an 8:50am shuttle bus to the rock, and began to make our way to the base of the climb.

Day 31

Our flight from Perth to Ayers Rock was scheduled for 7am, a despicably early hour considering that we would have to get up at 5. Somehow we managed it, and said goodbye to Lotta at quarter to six.

Day 30

No journal available

location:Perth
summary:Tour of Pinnacles and sand dunes, sandboarding
trip:australia00
day:30

Day 29

No journal available

location:Perth
summary:King’s Park with Lotta, (J+D went to Freemantle)
trip:australia00
day:29