Hello from Darwin!

Had a wicked trip up from Alice to here - and did it so cheap as well which is always a bonus!

Was pretty sad to leave Alice, was only there for about 3 days or something, but I really liked the place! Met loads of people too, and there was a really good atmosphere in the hostel I was in! The situation with the aboriginals was a bit strange though. Interesting place!

Anyway, I put loads of adverts up around the internet and the hostel, as it turned out the cheap campervan I had got seated 5 people - cool, cos it's cheaper so I wanted to fill it up to split costs and luckily I managed to! So, roadtrip to Darwin with Kat (from Canada, met her in Adelaide and we were staying in the same hostel in Alice), then three lads who were travelling together - Will and John both from the UK and Freddo from France! Really cool lads, had a wicked time - SO much better than roadtrip with Vera and Sarah!

So, Team Freebee as we nicknamed ourselves, set off from Alice on the 13th, to arrive in Darwin on the 16th... 1500km in 4 days (well 3.5). Stopped at a place called Three Ways on the first night - called so because there are 3 major routes originating from this point - North to Darwin, South to Adelaide or East to Mount Isa in Queensland. The Highways all join here. Managed to get away without paying for the campsite on the first night - Team Freebee was born! We didn't pay for any of our 3 campsites. Pretty good going!

Next day we headed north and arrived in Daly Waters at about 3pm and spent the afternoon and evening drinking here. Daly Waters is famous for it's pub. It's one of the major places on that stretch of road for travellers - and as people have passed through there on their journeys, they've left loads of little bits and pieces and the walls and pub are covered in memorabilia from around the world. There were LOADS of bras hanging from the ceiling, g-strings and boxers, there were LOADS of stubby holders, coins, flags, photos, ID cards, and a wooden leg! Outside there was a gazebo type thing covered in thongs, and loads of numberplates from all over the world. It was pretty cool! Very expensive though, so we bought a crate of beers (STILL expensive, but the cheaper option) and went back to the van.

We met a few guys who were travelling and they came to join us for beers - we had a campfire going and the one guy was telling us about the star constellations we could see. There was this one thing called the emu, which looked like an emu (strange that), from the way there were no stars. If that makes sense. The black gaps with no stars looked like an emu (and he then went on to tell us that this black space is actually where the matter in space is the most dense and we see the black space because no light can penetrate all the matter/rocks and dust floating around there in that space). Apparently you can only see this thing 2 or 3 times a year so that was pretty cool!

Yeah, then we left the campsite (without paying haha) and continued the road north... On the last night we camped at Litchfield National Park - and lit another campfire, thinking we knew what we were doing, but we couldn't get it to stay lit! I got eaten alive by mozzies (they were all in the van and it was so hot I couldn't sleep in my sleeping bag, hence, I got attacked. Literally - I kept waking up scratching so I had to take sleeping tablets last night!) Woke up the next morning and escaped with out paying again (this is why people hate backpackers me thinks hahaha), and went for a nice dip in one of the waterfalls near by! It was really nice, until I got bit by a fish. I reckon it was a piranha. Lucky to be alive I say!

Continued on to Darwin and arrived there at lunchtime ish. Checked into a (very expensive) hostel and took the van (nicknamed Vera!) back to it's little home.

The guys have moved onto Broome, and me and Kat are still here. I'm going to Kakadu for 3 days tomoro (a national park - the biggest in Oz and world heritage listed), and Kat is looking for a ride to Carins.

Wicked time on the way up here though - cool guys and only cost us $100 each to get up here - all fuel, food, alcohol (and there was a fair bit of that!), and accomodation! Nice one. Not very happy that with Vera and Sarah I ended up spending like nearly $300. We had to drive the van at like 80km /90km an hour, saved fuel and we were a heavy vehicle! Vera drove at like 130km and they were propbably just as heavy - the fuel cost an absolute fortune cos of that!

So yeah, now in Darwin, spent a couple of days by the pool sunning myself and the tan is slowly coming back - YAY! Not really done a lot - Darwin is very expensive and my Kakadu trip tomorrow has cost a fortune! Think me and Kat might go to the night markets tonight after our cheap $3.50 meal and a few glasses of goon! Lovely lovely.

In a bit dudes. x