After snoozing on the sofa for about 45 minutes, reception opened and I booked in. Provided with a sheet, a key, the keycode (finally) and a bag of plates, I dumped all my stuff and headed for breakfast. Despite having eaten the sausage and chips earlier, I’m never one to pass up free food, so I tucked into the pancakes (smearing them with chocolate sauce) and had a cuppa.

I got talking to a few people who’ve been in Darwin for some time, and at midday decided to go for a walk. There’s a small beach nearby, so that was the direction I headed. The weather was very hot, but dry. Strangely this got to me more than the humid Asian head I’ve become accustomed to. The beach was a pleasant stroll, ending with some curious rocks with pools. My feet got a mud bath and I almost lost my sandals when I found some very boggy ground partway towards the distant sea (tide was out), but I washed them in one of the rock pools.

 Overhead, a couple of birds circled. I found out later that they’re some type of Kite, a bird of prey. They’re quite common in this area.

On the way back I stopped off at the nearby bottle shop and bought myself one beer, a bottle of passion fruit flavour pop, a chocolate Paddle Pop (I ate a load of these in Bangkok) and my first bag of salt and vinegar crisps in a long time!

 Back at the hostel I napped for a little over an hour before waking to get ready for dinner. A local pub/club – The Vic – provides meals for a whole dollar on production of a voucher provided by most local hostels and tour operators. They’ll also “upgrade” it to a full portion for $6. Mindful of the dinky servings at Nomads in Aukland, I made sure I had some cash on me and went out with four other hostel residents. I fully expected to return around 10pm (dinner’s served from 8 till 9), but someone mentioned there was a pub quiz.

 Which we came second in. And won a $50 bar tab. I managed to gain us five points in one of the between-rounds games by licking a baby’s nappy clean. Panic not, it was smeared with peanut butter rather than genuine baby poo. I also thought tactically and pretty much just rubbed the nappy violently into my beard, hence cleaning the baby underwear faster than anyone else.

Frankly, however, we were robbed as we certainly had more correct answers than we were being awarded points for. Having said that, if we’d won another $50 I don’t think we’d have made it back to the hostel! As it was, several beers, a strawberry daquari slushie and a Jagerbomb was enough. 

The budget terminal at Changi Airport was a pleasant surprise with a free laptop connection and fast internet available. The connection was good enough that I managed to Skype home and talk to my mum for the first time in… erm… ages.

After converting all my remaining US and Singapore dollars to Aussie ones, I had just enough left (with a small donation from the girl beside me) for an orange juice and a Toblerone on the plane. Whoop. Sleep was hard coming as it always is on a flight, at least for me, and I probably managed a total of 45 minutes’ sleep during the journey.

We got to Darwin slightly late, but no big deal. It was a pleasant 20-ish degrees and 3am. After filling in the immigration cards – that were more bothered about nuts, wood and bananas then they were about Semtex or Kalashnikovs – we queued up for passport control.

Guess who forgot that everyone entering Oz, apart from residents, needs a visa. Whoops.

Fortunately, the airline got the blame as they shouldn’t have let me on the flight in the first place. The immigration chap asked me how I got on the plane. “Well”, I told him, “I kind of just… walked on. Like you do.”

It seems my passport hadn’t been checked and I wasn’t on the flight register or anything. So Tiger Airways are in for a hefty fine. Myself? Visa sorted at no cost. Cool. And it’s multi-entry, lasts for a year and allows me to stay for up to 3 months per visit.

After all that, I needed some munchies, so after working through the rest of the immigration procedure (two lovly dogs sniffing the luggage before it was x-rayed for rogue rambutans and Al-Quaeda pumpkins) I wandered to a vending machine.

Drink. Hmm. Orange juice looks nice. Insert money, press E…7… and watch machine go ape. Arms goes up, conveyor belt moves, arm goes down, belt moves. Up, down, shake it all around. At one point, the drink I’d ordered even moved slightly. Then my money was refunded in small change. You wonder why these machines always have “exact change only” on them? It’s because when they refund you, they don’t give you your actual money back. They chuck out the same amount in really small bitty change, just to be annoying.

OK, give up on a drink. Crisps. Salt and vinegar! B… 3… insert money. Oh. The coins just stuck in the slot and didn’t go down. I managed to hook out a 20c piece, but had to leave the rest in there. Grr.

I finally found a machine that did want to part with its contents after wandering to the other end of the terminal, by which time the shuttle bus was ready to leave.

20 minutes or so later, I was dropped off at the Gecko Lodge. Typically hostelly, just with a small pool at the front and a lounge area open to the elements at the front. Oh, and a locked gate with a combination to which I hadn’t been given the code.

Luckily, another guy on the bus was stopping here and he’d been given the keycode. I wandered in, dropped my stuff and went for a walk as he crashed out in his room. A quick wander back the way the bus had come in located a 24-hour foodery. Chips, sausage and a pint of full cream milk. Oh yes! Real milk after all these weeks!

I walked as far as the nearby bay just as the sky changed from black to dark blue. The number of people out jogging at 5am was surprising.

Back at the hostel, I got in no problem as I’d made a note of the keycode. A young couple were sat on one of the couches having arrived from Bali in the early hours. Like myself, they hadn’t been given the keycode but were in luck as someone else was arriving back at the hostel just as they got there.

So, I’m now sat here with no internet. It’s 7:08am (having discovered that the time difference between here and Singapore is an hour and a half) and I’m struggling to feel tired enough to nod off. This is going to be an interesting, and possibly expensive, couple of days. The trips around here are very pricey compared to Asia!