Eldonita: 01.10.2018
3. Only travel day, from Cairns to Darwin.
Every day starts with breakfast, so does ours. With a lot, and I mean a lot of food, because we still had so much in the fridge. So we had toast with bacon, eggs and baked beans (very British) and afterwards fruit with yogurt (very German). Unfortunately, the original packaged 1/4 watermelon had to be left for the cleaning lady.
Just set up a schedule for today: The plane leaves at 3:10 pm, be there 2 hours before, refuel and return the car at 12:00 pm departure. Unfortunately, we had to leave the apartment at 10:00 am and we couldn't think of anything better than jumping into the pool. It was wonderful, getting out of the heavy hiking boots and jeans again. You're probably wondering why we didn't fly in shorts and flip-flops.
Airlines and their baggage restrictions can be so cruel. You might still remember our 3rd article - "Here we go". The one with the unmet suitcase weight. 28 kg for mine and 26 kg for Carsten's bag. For all flights, this means underweight, except for today's. You may already know the magical number of 23 from your own vacations. This magical number forced us into the thick hiking boots, jeans and 3 jackets. In addition, our backpack strangely gained a lot of weight.
But we made it. Quantas doesn't bring us to our knees. Some call it stinginess, we call it challenges and they are meant to be overcome. Anyone can pay for overweight baggage.
And then we get on a plane that is not even a quarter full. Even 28 kg in the suitcase (instead of in the backpack and us) wouldn't have tilted the plane. But so far, so good.
And whenever I sit in the airplane, the song by Reinhard May comes to mind "over the clouds, freedom will probably be boundless, all fears, all worries are said to remain hidden below and then..."
So, have I planted the earworm in you too?
The important thing is we landed safely - in Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory (up in the north). Named after the naturalist Charles Darwin - known to all of us from biology class (a long time ago). Darwin is a relatively young city, founded in 1869, 100 years after Thomas Cook, who is thus ruled out as the founder. Strategically significant for the English in World War II. In 1942, it was completely bombed by the Japanese. What you can find a lot here, besides the most diligent beer drinkers in the world and sand everywhere, are crocodiles. The "freshies" that are harmless to humans and the "salties" that eat humans. We don't want to encounter either of them in the wild.