2026 Down Under - stage 2 - Darwin

From Singapore we flew in to Darwin - in the middle of cylcone season - but all was calm during our 3 nights/2 days stay. Our accommodation was at a fairly upmarket airport resort run by 3 diffeent hotel brands. We got picked up by the resort shuttle for the short journey to our room. We were so close to the airport that we could have walked it. Despite this proximity, planes landing and leaving never disturbed us - we never heard them.

Our room was at the fringe of the resort with what looked like jungle backing on to us. We had our own little pool too - lovely.

After a decent night's sleep followed by breakfast at the Pool Bar, we ordered an Uber to take us on the 15 minute ride downtown. The Tourist Information Centre gave us some good advice which we planned to follow, starting with a wander round the harbour:

A big part of Darwin's history relates to the second world war when it was attacked incessantly by Japanese war planes. There's a fine exhibition, complete with 360 degree vision via VR sets. It's attached to the history of the Flying Doctor service where we used the VR headsets again to fly over King's Canyon and land the small plane on a short dirt strip. There are static depictions as well:

Walking back to the town centre we had planned to jump on a bus to take us to the main museum but the timetable worked against us and we wouldn't get there until 10 minutes before it closed, so we decided to just chill with beers at a local bar before riding with Uber back to our resort.

We used room service and had a nice meal and a bottle of wine before turning in.

On day 2 we decided that, rather than go back to downtown Darwin we would have a well-deserved rest day and just enjoy the lovely resort instead. After all, we had a very early start in the morning so it was room service again and an early night.

Morning arrived and the shuttle took us back to the terminal. Some dark clouds were just about visible - a short storm was passing through. We boarded the plane but had to sit on the runway for 45 minutes to allow the storm to fully pass but soon we were on our way to Adelaide.

From snow in Banchory to the heat of Singapore

I definitely spoke too soon in my last post when I said winter hadn't started. Somebody must have heard me because the snow suddenly arrived between Christmas and New Year - with a vengeance. Gary and Luca didn't dare to travel from Inverurie to Banchory for their New Year's Day dinner - steak pie and trifle - and they made the right decision as they might have got stuck in Banchory for a few days. We had also had to cancel our plans for a Hogmanay late lunch in Drumoak with Anne and Leslie.

Once in to 2026, our main concern was getting out of Aberdeen. The day before we were due to fly to Singapore via London, our airport was closed, but thankfully the snow relented a little and we were able to leave on schedule.

We arrived in Singapore in the early evening and checked in to our beautiful colonial themed hotel just in time for a quick bite in the members' lounge before heading to our small but well appointed room for a good night's sleep.

We had 4 nights - 3 full days - in the city state and walked round places familiar and new to us. Often cloudy but the temperature never strays far from the 30 C mark - not even overnight.

One of the familiar spots was Fort Canning park:

Jo overcame her fears and made it to the top of the iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel this time - and felt completely safe looking over the whole country from 50 + storeys up:

One of our favourite evenings was when we went to what is known coloquially as "Satay Street". The road is blocked off at both ends and long tables are set up alongside a whole row of street vendors basically doing nothing but barbecued satay - lovely.

The Family WhatsApp group contains a number of photos taken on our stay in Singapore so I'll end here.