Big Trip

Woken by two huge claps of thunder in the night, but not for long. Checked in at the hotel, to find that the receptionist's sister lives in Banbury (she couldn't remember where). Walked down to local shops to forage for brekkie. Darwin looks much more frontier-ish than anywhere else we've seen so far - low-rise buildings, spread out, slightly tatty. Houses seem to squeeze into tropical gardens, lots of palms around. Disturbed a tree on the way back, and was rewarded with a screeching mob of rainbow lorikeets taking off. Packed for the next few days out on trips, and met Sab, our guide for the Kakadu & Arnhemland part of the trip. He's a proper (perhaps more stereotypical) Aussie, of which there are many more in Darwin than Sydney. He asked us if we'd mind him sending us with a different guide on the first day because he has a tourism award ceremony to go to (he's been nominated for one) and reckons he'll have too bad a hangover to be any use to us. Great bloke.
After lunch, went to see if Woolies in Darwin is anything like Sydney. It is, though the GF bread is frozen. Took a taxi down to Cullen Bay, where Erin & I went beachcombing. We had the beach completely to ourselves, thanks to the box jellyfish. Seems a shame to live in such a nice spot on the ocean, but not to be able to take advantage of it.
One of the taxi drivers was saying how much he likes the heat in Darwin. It's 30-34 degrees here all year round. He described 22 degrees as "freezing".
Erin was sick at bedtime, but only once. We reckon she had a dodgy chicken nugget (if you dare say I told you so, Jamie Oliver...) at teatime. Turns out it was fine this morning, though.

So today we've been to Litchfield National Park on a day trip with a different company. Bit of an early start (0650: what's the O stand for?...) but there were only 7 of us on the bus, so pickups weren't too arduous. In fact, we appear to have picked the perfect time of year to go, as the whole park was very quiet. Mind you, Interesting Fact #1 for the day is that there are only around 200,000 people in the whole of the Northern Territory, and around 170,000 of them live within a 50km radius of Darwin. I guess there's bound to be a bit of open space, then.
Had a couple of 1000-miles-to-the-horizon moments on the way to the park. Just green wilderness as far as the eye can see, and then some. Saw a couple of wedge-tailed eagles soaring high in the sky too. Failed to get a photo of a rock wallaby on the walk down to Florence Falls, but had a great swim in the pool at the bottom. Max & Erin were a bit reticent about getting in, which Erin overcame, but Max was still very wary.
The rocks around the pool were very slippery, and in fact, one of our coach party slipped and caught his forehead & bridge of his nose on a rock, giving himself some nasty cuts & bruises. He seemed OK, though, after a sit down and some patching up.
Saw some amazing cathedral and magnetic termite mounds on the way to lunch. The cathedral mounds are huge and buttressed - the ones we saw were about 10-12 feet high - and the magnetic ones are flatter, but all aligned north-south. When there are lots, they look like a huge number of headstones. It's all to do with different strategies for temperature control, apparently. More swimming at Wangi (pron. "one-guy") Falls after lunch, and then Max & Erin performed some spectacular bombs at Buley Rock Holes - a cascade of rock pools down a valley. They were both excellent, though in some respects (mainly the wash) slightly outdone by some 20+ stone members of another party.
Back for quick tea & bed.
A great day out - we've seen some lovely scenery today, and the low numbers of people around made it really relaxed. It's probably horrible in high season, judging by the size of the car parks at some of these places, but not this time of year. I think I prefer this part of Australia to Sydney.