Who could heed the words of Charlie Darwin...

Our flight to Australia was not until 1am so before we left Bali we managed to fit in one more walk in the rice fields , where we chatted to locals working their land,  a yoga class – our first ever which I loved but Mr L wasn't so sure and another massage & manicure. 
Bali airport, whilst very modern was very slow & it took us 1 ¼ hrs to get through to the departure area. As you know I get anxious at  airports & find inefficiency  frustrating however I used the opportunity to try out my yoga breathing which passed the time. 
On arrival at Darwin, we waited for our luggage whilst being watched by the border control officers eyeing up their next ‘victim’. I was, of course, convinced that we would be selected for search. On the one occasion you don’t want your luggage to come through  first ours did, so we were the first to run the gauntlet of border officers. Maybe it's my honest face or maybe they had their eye on a bigger catch but we were waved through without a thought. I was almost offended by their rejection. I had packed my bag so neatly & cleaned my shoes so well I wanted to open my bag to show them, to get their approval ‘wow what a tidy & efficiently packed case you have mam’ ‘the best we've seen’   but that would be madness so instead we walked to the taxi rank. 
We arrived at our hotel At 6am. The notice at the closed  reception/office stated it opened at 7am & politely reminded guests that check in was not until 2pm! We were shattered.  Fortunately the kind receptionist took pity on us & we were checked into our (upgraded) room & asleep by 8.30am. 
We spent a few days exploring downtown Darwin, mostly in the rain as it's the wet season, although it's still v hot. In truth it can be explored in a few hours but we used downtime to  come up with a plan for our trip. On our third day in Darwin we hired a car to explore. It was the first time we had driven since we left the UK & was good to be back in control again. We visited a few nature reserves & saw our first wallabies but many of the trails were closed due to flooding. It was good to get out & about though & it gave us a taste of how vast this place is & how empty. There was hardly any traffic on the roads, even the highways. It made us wonder why they bother having a traffic report on the radio as there is no traffic! 
The following day was Australia Day so we signed ourselves up for the Darwin Pub Crawl. When in Rome… We joined approx 60 people (mostly under 35) dressed as ‘Bogans’ or in flags/hats at 11am & visited 8 different bars, having at least one drink in each, with various games & competitions- pie eating, fancy dress, limbo,etc  finishing (and we were literally finished)  at 8pm. It was brilliant!! We met & talked to so many people – including an obsessive George Michael fan (C.D – I think she was more obsessed than you) and what we discovered is that no one actually comes from Darwin. Most people have either come from UK or other parts of Australia or are moving through, making it a very transient & disparate population. Whatever or whoever they are though they were great fun- very welcoming & inclusive even with a couple of middle aged Brits.  We ended the evening with Mr L in a mullet wig & sunnies with his new Aussie pal & me in an Aussie flagged hairband, arms around a fellow drinker singing along to Oasis.  A great introduction to Australia.
Thankfully we survived pretty much unscathed- which was a relief as we were flying to Cairns the next morning. Our plan had been to drive from Darwin to Perth. However not only is it wet season in the Northern Territory it's also cyclone season & whilst we are always keen to take on a challenge, this didn't seem a risk worth taking. So after a few days in Cairnswe will pick up a v small camper van from 'Hippee Campers' & spend the next month driving along on the road well travelled - the east coast route from Cairns to Sydney, at a leisurely pace, stopping wherever & whenever  the fancy takes us.