Adventures In Darwin

We arrived in Darwin around 5:30 on Thursday evening and spent the next two to three hours trying to find a place to stay for the night. It turns out camping in a tent is pretty much impossible in Darwin. None of the caravan parks allow it and if you try to do it on the side of the road somewhere you get slapped with a hefty fine. We didn’t know this before arriving so we drove to several different caravan parks receiving several different rejections with accompanying dirty looks. If we had known what a hard time we were going to have finding a place to say in Darwin we would have camped in Katherine the previous night.

We ended up finding a reasonably priced hostel in the downtown area before discovering the second major downfall of Darwin: there is no parking. We were on a street with several hotels and hostels and there were less than 100 over night parking spots. We drove around for over an hour before finding a place to leave the car for the night but Jesse still had to get up and move it before 8am to avoid a fine.

I was pretty over the city before we even got a chance to explore. I wanted to leave the next day but not before our appointment at Crocosaurus Cove. Another item on my bucket list for this trip was to swim with a crocodile and I was going to make that happen in Darwin! We spent most of the morning checking out the fish and lizards. We also got to feed some baby crocs before it was finally our turn to climb into the cage of death (a large clear tube made of very thick plastic) and go for a swim with a vicious killer.

The cage of death experience only lasts 15 minutes but it felt much longer. Our crocodile Chopper was quite cooperative during our visit and spent most of the time right next to the cage and we were told we probably had the best experience out of the day. The also fed Chopper while we were in his tank and he lunged for us with his jaw open. I scream like a little girl as he slammed against our plastic cage then laughed nervously as he inched away. It was slightly terrifying but also exhilarating and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

We climbed out of the cage, showered, changed, and headed for the reptile house where we would look at our photographs with Chopper and were also given the opportunity to hold a baby crocodile named Fluffy. This experience to me was even scarier than swimming with a fully-grown crocodile. Jesse and I got some good pictures together and he got some great ones by himself but when it was my turn to hold the croc solo I freaked out a little. Jesse and I got some good shots together and he got some great ones by himself but when it was my turn to hold the baby I got a bit squeamish and my pictures didn’t turn out very well.

Once we had finished our crocodile adventure we decided to head out of town to find a place to stay for the night but not too far out of town, as Jesse wanted to check out some local markets in the morning. We made our way to Litchfield National Park where they gladly welcomed people in tents and I had the best sleep I have had since starting this adventure.

We woke up bright and early and made our way back into Darwin. The markets Jesse wanted to visit were thriving when we arrived. This market was quite a lot bigger than the one in Broome and also a lot busier. We forced our way through the bustling crowds and eventually came across a few good finds. Jesse bought some spices and a present for his mom and I picked up a summery dress to help avoid the heat.

We checked out the food vendors at the market but nothing really jumped out at us and Jesse really wanted to try crocodile so we made our way down to the wharf. He had a crocodile schnitzel and I had a chicken stir-fry. As most of you know I'm really not very adventurous with my food but I did try a piece of Jesse’s and it tasted like chicken only fishier.

We spent most of the afternoon wandering aimlessly around Darwin and did a bit of grocery shopping before heading back to the caravan park where we made use of the running water at the campsite and made some pasta instead of our go-to dinner of sausages. We also did some laundry but by the time I had the tent put away the following morning you never would have guessed that I owned any clean clothing.

The next morning we explored Litchfield National Park. I had originally wanted to visit Kakadu National Park but it was a long ways away and was fairly expensive to get into so we opted to explore Litchfield instead since we were already there and there was no entry fee. We saw magnetic termite mounds that were over five meters tall, some water falls, and a few swimming holes.

After a few hours of sightseeing we headed back to the caravan park where we grabbed a quick bite to eat before hitting the road once again. By this point we had decided to make a major change in our itinerary: we would no longer be driving all around Australia. Instead we would cut through the middle and head home so instead of heading East we started to head South. Slowly but surely we are on our way home.