Just over a week in Darwin, so it's time to give an update on some of our adventures, including FINALLY getting to see a sunset!! Be prepared for lots of sunset selfies.

We arrived on Wednesday just in time to collected my Mum Alice, also known as Nally, from the airport.

After picking up Nally and grabbing some lunch we headed to our caravan park to check in. Our 2 bedroom cabin is on the small side, but that just makes it easy to clean up!! It is very exciting to be just near the jumping pillow, and not too far from the lovely big pool. Plus Nally was just 2 cabins away in her studio cabin. And while the laundry closes scandalously early (8 pm!) there are lovely big clothes lines to use, so I'm very happy. Which is good, because despite my original plan to have a week here and then a week in an AirBnB in Parap, due to a reservation snaffu (I forgot to cancel the second week at the caravan park and it was too late to get our money back from the park but not the AirBnB booking😔😵😢) we're here for the full 2 weeks of our stay in Darwin.

On Thursday we did a bit of shopping at the local shopping centre, including my personal highlight of a set of hooks to go over a door to hang up all our towels. I honestly don't understand where they expect us to put 5 towels in these places when there is not a single hook anywhere in the cabin?!?!? Then we headed for the Mindil sunset markets for dinner, which was as lovely as everyone says. Nally found some gorgeous earrings made from leaves that had been collected just as they were turning coloured and then set in resin, and the kids had a lovely chat with (and were gifted some beautiful small samples from) a couple who sold zebra stones.

On Friday we went on a bit of a wild goose chase trying to find a small wetsuits for Josie, who is absolutely LOVING all the swimming, but does suffer from the cold after a while. Alas, there were none to found in Darwin, and the one I ordered online probably won't arriving at the caravan park till after we leave. Sigh. We'll just have to keep working on fattening her up so she's got a bit more inbuilt insulation!!

I had organised a bit of a surprise for the kids for Saturday, getting tickets to a magic show that was on as part of the Darwin Festival. The Maho Magic Bar was very cool, with close up magicians from Japan and a ring mistresses from Australia performing some amazing tricks. Toby was keen to suss out how they did the tricks, but was also able to enjoy the spectacle of it all!

Mum and I started the Matilda's game at the bar at the caravan park, but ended up heading back to watch the penalty shoot out in her cabin, so I could pace (and swear, sorry Alice!) freely! What a night that was - even the kids watched it (having not been very interested before that) but then they thought all games ended in a penalty shoot out!

On Sunday Alice and I headed to the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair at the convention centre, which was just spectacular. So much beautiful painting, weaving, fashion, pottery, homewares - it had everything! It was really lovely to visit the booths of the cultural centres / art galleries we've already visited, as well as looking at the art from places where we will be visiting soon, to give me some sense of what to look out for once we get there. We even got to see Red Flag dancers from the remote community of Numbulwar in Arnhem Land who were just stunning. Both Mum and I made some purchases, which was very exciting if not a little nerve-wracking.

Monday was our last full day with Nally, so we took full advantage by spending a lovely morning at the wave pool at the waterfront. It was a really lovely set up - nice seats under the shade, beautiful clear water, a nice balance between waves and calm - it was just delightful!

Then we went to see the sunset over the Timor Sea at the Darwin Sailing Club. I had intended to take Bek's suggestion and have dinner at the Darwin Trailer Boat Club, but we just went into the first club we saw, which ended up being next door to the one Bek suggested. Oh well, it was still very lovely!

On Tuesday we took Alice to the airport to get her home in time for the big 18th birthday celebration (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR BEAUTIFUL GIRL ALISON!) It was sad to say goodbye, but we'd had such a lovely time we her so we could only be grateful she'd braved the plane to come and see us. Unfortunately Qantas gave us one more kick in the pants on her way out - I'd bought a small duffel for her to take home some new purchase / items that were less useful that we'd thought when we packed them, but apparently these days Qantas charges $100 for excess baggage based on the number of bags, as well as the cumulative weight. SO RUDE!! So I guess we'll just keep jamming everything into the car / roof box / trailer.

Yesterday we headed to the Museum and Art Gallery of Northern Territory, where we checked out their very cool natural history section, plus an exhibition on Cyclone Tracy and the winners of the 2023 National Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander Art Awards, which were amazing.

In the evening we watched the valiant Matildas in their hard fought semi-final against England. We all learned a hard lesson in sportsball - the highest highs are often followed by terrible defeats. But we were all so proud of them and, as a million opinion pieces have said, they truly unified so much of the country in joy and pride after a rough few years.

So that's been our first week in Darwin. We're to the waterpark for some waterslides now - yay!