Darwin.

Darwin. Journey’s End.

The nose of the campervan pointed at the Timor Sea. After something like 5,000km (possibly more), we were at journey’s end. Literally, the end of the road: the steep slipway at Darwin’s swanky marina dipped into the lapping waves of the green ocean … it was as far as the road could take us – and as close to the water’s edge as we could go. Any thought of some celebratory naked dip in the balmy tropical waters was swiftly knocked on the head:

 “There be salties,” said Tracey, our fixer, and resident of these environs. To prove the point Tracey rattled off a number of Croc Stories ranging from the Aren’t People Stupid To Ignore The Signs variety to the genuinely disturbing – including a rather Captain Hook like tale of the croc that waited at the foot of a tree for 48 hours for his or her... er.. backpacker lunch. Needless to say, we put the trusty DreamHaven (or some such name) into reverse and went to explore the delights of Darwin.

First off: Charles Darwin never visited Darwin. The city was named in his honour by one of the early explorers. Second up: it’s a rather lovely little city, surrounded on three sides by the sea. The air is clean. The people, genuinely relaxed. Darwin shines. There’s a natural squint to the place, and I mean that in a good way: it feels like it is lit by the ocean. Third, and there’s no way to avoid this: it gets clammy!

 In the Build Up – the weeks ahead of the Rainy Season – temperatures can hit 40-odd, relentlessly, with a humidity that you can cut through with a butter-knife.

 “You just have to get used to sweating,” said Tracey with relish,  admiring my attempt at simultaneously wiping my brow and focussing the camera.

 Some snap shots of the city:

Snap: Darwin was famously bombed in the Second World War by the same Japanese fleet that attacked Pearl Harbour. There’s an impressive mural on the pier, where the cruise ships now dock, depicting the surprise attack in February 1942. Too-casually dubbed Australia’s Pearl Harbour, more bombs were actually dropped on Darwin that day than in Pearl Harbour the previous December, and constitutes the worst attack on Australian soil of the War.

Snap: Darwin basks in a certain pride of being closer (geographically at least) to Indonesia than to Canberra. People gladly hop over to Bali for a weekend. As that statement may suggest, there are some well-to-do inhabitants here. The area of Fanny Bay boasts its own Millionaire’s Row, with an array of huge white palaces only part-hidden by palm trees. The yachts in the marina and harbour bob at their moorings with that knowing confidence wealth alone brings.

 Snap: the Saltie in the Sea problem has been resolved by the creation of a huge outdoor swimming pool with wave-effect machine. OK it’s not quite the same as lounging on a beach, but at least you know it’s safe. And very smart it is too. If a little surreal. Sipping a flat-white in the humid heat surrounded by men in Hawaiian shorts, women in skimpy bikinis, kids in swimsuits: it’s a little like being on a cruise ship on dry land. All the time the sea moans for attention not more than 100m away.

Snap: the beer tastes supremely good. There’s nothing quite like the beer at the end of a road-trip. I am happy to report that the beer in Darwin measures up to the Ice Cold in Alex-like anticipation and expectation of this intrepid traveller. And I shall make time here to reference how good the food (and beer) (and wine) has been all trip. Even the Mrs Mack’s Pie was exactly right, at exactly the right time. But from the first night’s Thai to the last night’s Hanuman Jungle Curry via emu, kangaroo, camel, barramundi, eggs, bacon, more eggs, more bacon, burgers, Vegemite, fries, lamb, steak… the food has been generally fabulous. Top dish? It would have to be a fight between the Jungle Curry and the Kangaroo at the Parchilna roadhouse. I’d probably lean towards the ‘roo because, well .. just because… when you’re in the middle of nowhere, on a dirt road, dust in your throat, grit in your eyes, flies dive-bombing your every move, and you sit down and … but I’ve forgotten about the star-lit feast at King’s Canyon… Too many good meals.

And Vegemite. What. A. Revelation. Thank you, Kent.

As you’d expect, the last night conversation soon turned to most memorable experience, favourite thing, and so on. For me, it’s perhaps not the obvious. Yes, the iconic landscapes of the Flinders Ranges, of Uluru, of Kakadu, are all phenomenal, and will live with me forever … but it’s the incidental stuff that I will cherish above all. The weird stuff like the van breaking down at the UFO centre in Wycliffe Well (the engine power just… went…); the inspiring isolation you feel on the Oonadatta Track when you’re the only car on the road and the road goes on to the horizon; the people you meet, like Saturday Ed from Sunday Creek, or Kent, or Tracey, or the ageing punk barista creating her own range of cappuccino-based coffees at the Desert Oaks Motel; or… well, of course I could go on.. but these are my memories. You will have your own. Go find them.

Yes, mate. Adelaide’s that way.