Darwin

Saturday 21 May: Nearly everything in Darwin is new thanks to a little lady called cyclone Tracy who leveled the city on Christmas eve 1974, just 30 years after the Japanese unsuccessfully tried to do the same. The State Library of Northern Territory, housed in the new state parliament building, is ideal for my purposes with free internet and a set of Lonely Planet country guides. I spent all my free time there planning a route home.
Sunday 22: A long walk north takes me to the Museum and Art Gallery of Northern Territory which disappointingly, apart from the maritime section, isn't a patch on the Alice Springs equivalent. I walk back along the coast and am delighted to discover I'm on Ian Fairweather walkway. A Scotsman of some repute, I've seen his impressionist paintings in a number of galleries but found them difficult to get in to. He painted and lived in poverty in a homemade shack on a island near here. His friends built him a proper house nearby but he refused to move but instead he stored his artwork in the house. Also an adventurer who fought in both world wars he built a raft from beach debris and sailed to Indonesia where he was imprisoned for a month - no visa. My sort of guy.
Photos of Darwin.