After such a hectic few days (it's hard work this travelling lark!) we set off from Hervey Bay and decided to break up the journey back to Brisbane and had a night in Noosa. It's a fab place, great beach and even better shops and restaurants, it's a bit like Marbella in Oz! We arrived at lunchtime and checked into our hostel and then wandered down to the beach to watch the surfers. We had a walk round town and nearly spent all our savings on a picture by Peter Lik called The Opera - have a look -http://www.peterlik.com.au/led/LED_abstract.html but we decied we'd rather have another 3 months on hols! We had a bottle of wine over looking the main street and then treated ourselves to a fab meal out - when in Rome!

The next day was the start of the journey to Darwin. We left Noosa in the afternoon and caught the bus to Brisbane airport. We then flew to Darwin that evening. We arrived the early hours of the morning (although it wasn't as late as we thought as we missed the time change - again). We caught the shuttle and arrived at the hostel. To say it was nothing like the website would be a real understatement - it was rank! We thought we'd been getting used to staying in some basic places but this was grim. Plastic covers on the mattresses, blood stained sheets and no air con in +30 degrees and people screaming outside the window - oh joy! But we managed to get some sleep.

The next day we went about sorting out the next leg of our trip and booked a day trip to Litchfield National Park. We walked around the city then went back to the hostel with more of a 'if you can't beat them..' attitude and had a few beers at the pool bar and watched the rugby before retiring to our luxury suite!

Thursday was an early start with a 7.15am pick up for our day trip to Litchfield. When we booked it the guy said it was a bit of an older crowd who went on this trip so we thought he meant 30 somethings but no - they were 90% retired! Even though we knew it wasn't going to be a 'fun packed' day out it turned out to be very relaxing. We visited the giant termite mounds, went to Tolmer, Wangi and Florence Falls which were all beautiful. We had a swim at Florence Falls which was amazing, the current from the falls was unbelievable but it made for a glorious swim. We headed back at 5pm and went across the road for a Thai and then bed.

We decided that we would check out of the hostel the next day and moved to the Travelodge in Darwin and got a townhouse half price as we booked last minute. It was bliss, two lovely pools and our room was fab - yoorah for air con! We had a relaxing couple of days and made the most of the happy hours at the pool bar but our mini break had to come to an end and Sunday saw us setting off early - again - for the 11 hour bus journey to Kununurra - Bungle Bungles here we come!