WEEK 7 - SWEATY DARWIN

Hi from the hot and stinky travellers!

HOT, HOT, HOT TOO HOT DARWIN!

I'm sorry is this some sort of in house joke, the temp on the news says 32c, well I am here to tell you it is definitely around 40c. While you are all rugging up down there we are sweating our patooties off up here. Because of the late wet season up here it is still raining which means it hasn't cooled down yet for their winter. The wet season officially finishes the 1st of May, but they are a little late this year, so it's affecting a lot of the tourism up here. The first night we had a power failure due to bats flying into the transformer and the whole of Darwin was nearly out, apparently it happens all the time. We pulled that generator out as fast as we could, they had 30 cancellations the next day in the park! So that means our plans for Kakadu and the Kimberleys have been put on hold, everything is closed, and now the labour govt has bought in that you have to pay to go to these places now, we thought we'd put it off and head to W.A.

Without the heat Darwin is a really nice place, yes it feels remote and it's tropical, but what a melting pot of cultural diversity. It feels very alternative and easy going up here, I love it. Our first night was watching the sunset at the wharf where we had a beautiful barra dinner and everyone got to try some crocodile. Yes it tastes like chicken! When you see how big the harbour is here you can see how cyclone Tracey just blitzed this area and when Darwin was bombed in WW2 even though the Japanese were sneaky and went inland, they really had no chance.

The art gallery and museum is a great place for the kids to learn about the area and they had lots of fun dressing up and the cyclone Tracey information was really interesting for us oldies. To think they had a cyclone warning a week earlier and it turned into nothing and no one took it seriously when it actually happened is frightening. Who would have thought that midnight xmas eve anything bad was going to happen.

There are some cheap fun activities for the kids here including the fish feeding at Aquascene and the wave pool in the city. The markets are full of yummy cultural delights. A muddy for $18/kg - crazy.

The crocodile tour down the Adelaide River was full of crocs and bird life and the wetlands is really pretty. We had a chance to stop off at the war cemetery, which was beautifully looked after, and this was also the place where they were evacuated for the bombing. The kids got to be the tour guides, which we all had a cackle at! They took the job very seriously, maybe we should have got a discount?

Well after 10 000k in 7 weeks I must admit we are pretty tired. The days can sometimes gel into one another and you feel like you should be out there constantly doing things. But that can be exhausting. The kids have settled into the nomadic lifestyle, but I think they miss kid interaction from time to time. As for us we are missing some people our age as well. The grey nomads are so rude up here. We are pretty keen to get out of this heat and head west! So keep cool down there and thanks to all those people emailing and dropping us a line it's nice to hear from you all.

And a big happy birthday wish to our little Scarlett who turned 4 today!!!!!

TAM'S TIPS
Make sure that kids don't eat the bread you have to feed the fish, Spencer must of had a chomp on some mouldy bread and was up all night vomiting.

In addition to the heat there are Parana ants that attack with the speed of light up here, so be prepared to empty a can! ( The locals cool them ginger ants)