Back in Darwin..

The Convention Centre 

So here we are in Darwin, and it is raining.. just like Vancouver, only different. 

First of all, it is warm.  And then there are the regular daylight hours.. lots of light. 

While Australia struggles with fires and heat waves south and west of us, here in the NT things are comfortable.. really comfortable!  We are back in shorts, flip flops and t-shirts.  Sure they tell us there is a threat of a cyclone, but heck.. it is summertime in the Top End!  There is a cool breeze and the temperature has been hovering between about 24 and 28 degrees.  Perfect really..

We spent the weekend with Kim and M.. they live right downtown.  It is expensive to live there, but then again, it is expensive everywhere around here.  Even the newer suburbs, including Palmerston: where the head office of some of the ‘bush’ schools was located, housing is exorbitant. 

A walk around the inner harbour was fun and easy first thing in the morning.. and K&M were fabulous hosts: especially after the long trip from Canada.  They gave us a bed and a couple of meals that rivaled my mothers! 

It’s a great place this Darwin!  

John Lort Storkes of the HMS Beagle was the first to spot the Harbour in September of 1839 and he named it after Charles Darwin… ‘Darwin’s theory of evolution’.. that Charles Darwin. 

Thirty years later a permanent European settlement of 135 was established and christened Palmerston, after a British Prime Minister. 

The population of the area really took off after 1884 when the pearling industry imported people from Japan, Timor and the Philippines. 

In 1911 the government head of the NT changed from South Australia to the federal government and the name was changed to Darwin.  It is still a government town. 

There have been lots of changes in the more than 100 years since then! Some a result of geography, geology (gold) and weather (cyclones)..  But a LOT of people are employed by government..  Darwin is the largest city in the Territory as well as the capital.

Darwin, and the newer suburb of Palmerston just down the road a few clicks and the area king of the ‘Box’ superstores, will be where I will be spending most of my time for the next few month..  when I am not in Dundee Beach.