And Home - Jatbula Trip

 Post Day 3 – Sunday 25 August

The flight departed and landed on time.  I slept most of the way home.  We then waited until 6:30am for the first bus home – I definitely slept all of this.  We arrived home around 8am, had breakfast and then finally went to bed!

Flight Darwin to Brisbane JQ673 (Confirmation Number OGM96Y) 1:30am departure, land 5:40am

Aquascene and Howard Springs - Jatbula Trip

 Post Day 2 – Saturday 24 August

Aquascene and Howard Springs

We were woken around midnight/1am by all the planes coming and going from the airport.  We set our alarm for 5:15am to give us time to have breakfast and pack down our tent, before Nightcliff Parkrun at 7am.  This was very hot (26 degrees Celsius) and crowded. I finished in just under 26 minutes and was in position 99.

https://www.parkrun.com.au/nightcliff/

We then spent some time at Aquascene and saw mild fish, mangrove jack, coral trout and barramundi.  These fish are wild and come in from the ocean at particular tide points and are fed.  

https://www.aquascene.com.au/

We then drove back to the van park for a shower and to hand in our gate key.  We topped up our fuel and then bought some food for lunch.

We drove to Howard Springs Nature Park, hoping to have a swim.  This is a great green space not that far from Darwin with playgrounds, shade shelters, picnic tables, barbeques and opportunities for kids to get wet safely.  Unfortunately, the “swimming” area was not much more than ankle deep, but a spot to cool off none the less.  There was a very large shade shelter where we spread out all our wet gear to dry and then repacked everything ready for the flight home tonight. I took a walk through the forest (Howard Creek Walk) and also to the actual spring where the water emerges.  This park area was developed as a recreation area during WW2 and the concrete has the Australian Field Company details in it.

https://nt.gov.au/parks/find-a-park/howard-springs-nature-park

Next up was the Palmerston Water Park to play in the water park and go on the super slide like the big kid I am. 

https://northernterritory.com/darwin-and-surrounds/see-and-do/palmerston-water-park

We had a picnic dinner in the shade at the Palmerston Campus of Charles Darwin University and watch the sunset.

https://www.cdu.edu.au/locations/palmerston-campus

Last up we topped up our fuel and headed to the airport to rest until our flight. We arrived about 7:15pm and were soon joined by many young state tennis players who had just finished a week long tournament and were heading to their various states in the early hours.

Darwin WW2 Land and Sea Tour - Jatbula Trip

 Post Day 1 – Friday 23 August

Darwin – WW2 Land and Sea Tour

This morning we were up at 6am and drove to Doctors Gully for a tour of Darwin – WW2 by Land and Sea with tour guide Betty. Doctors Gully was the Catalina Flying Boat Base during WW2 and the area where the ramp was is now used for fish feeding. This began during WW2 when soldiers through their scraps into the water.

https://seadarwin.com/darwin-tours/australias-frontline-wwii/

https://www.enjoy-darwin.com/doctors-gully.html

Other interesting things I learnt:

• ·      A submarine attack was planned prior to the bombing of Darwin
• ·      More bombs were dropped on Darwin than Pearl Harbour
• ·      Bombers flew in from the southeast, ie over the land rather than from over the sea
• ·      Darwin is only 12 degrees south of the equator and 450km from the nearest Indonesian island
• ·      Large numbers of Dutch military evacuated from the Dutch East Indies were based in Darwin during WW2 as well as the Australians and Americans
• ·      Japanese pearl divers had frequented the northern coastline of Australia for many years and were able to provide a lot of intelligence to Japan during WW2
• ·      The indigenous inhabitants had a large number of fresh water wells
• ·      The seats along the esplanade in Darwin are designed to look like antiaircraft guns as the esplanade had many during WW2
• ·      The pillars on Parliament House are designed to look like the fins of bombs falling toward Darwin
• ·      Fujita scrap metal removed the top of four ships from the shipping channel as an act of reconciliation and donated crosses made from these to the Uniting Church (they are on the end of each pew)

During this tour we visited Survivors Lookout, the ammunition store bunker at Charles Darwin National Park and (East Point) Darwin Military Museum, finishing with a boat ride through the harbour viewing Darwin from the water.

The Government house is beside Survivor’s Lookout and looks serene from the outside.  It has survived the WW2 bombing of Darwin as well as multiple cyclones, including Cyclone Tracy. At Charles Darwin National Park an ammunition storage shelter has been fitted out with a great deal of information on WW2 specifically as well as munitions and their storage and movement more generally.  Overall, this was a good informative tour, even though we have been to some of these places before we learnt new things and gained a new perspective.

https://placesofpride.awm.gov.au/memorials/267512

https://northernterritory.com/darwin-and-surrounds/see-and-do/government-house-darwin

https://northernterritory.com/darwin-and-surrounds/see-and-do/wwii-raaf-explosive-storage-area-darwin

https://nt.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0013/200065/charles-darwin-national-park.pdf

https://northernterritory.com/darwin-and-surrounds/see-and-do/darwin-military-museum

Charles Darwin NP Ammunition Store

Darwin Military Museum

Harbour Cruise

Float from Anti-Submarine Boom Net

We then headed back to the caravan park for lunch and to wash our hiking gear and sort out some of our things.  As we didn’t have any pegs, we have draped washing all around the inside of our tent and vehicle.

The afternoon was spent exploring Darwin and visiting some of the places from this morning to spend a little more time. We took a walk through the rainforest and along the shoreline at Doctor’s Gully. 

St Mary’s Star of the Sea Cathedral was our nextspot – to admire the stained glass.  This was both traditional religious themed as well as acknowledging all the individual military corps of both Australia and United States of America.  

https://stmaryscathedral.com.au/

We visited the Darwin Memorial Uniting Church and looked in the windows at the crosses made of salvaged metal from ships sunk in Darwin harbour.

https://dmuc.unitingchurch.org.au/

I admired some of the old stone buildings and saw where the original overland telegraph made land in Darwin to begin its long journey south, just across from Survivor’s Lookout.  We returned to the car via the ever-beautiful Esplanade.

For dinner we headed to Palmerston Markets. These had a lot of the same vendors as at the Mindil Beach markets and the decision was almost as difficult as last night.  In the end we opted for Vegetable Noodles with Honey Chicken, Chicken and Cashew and Salt and Pepper Squid.

https://www.palmerstonmarkets.org.au/

Last up, a swim to cool off before bed.