Maleny to Darwin Day 9 - Homeward bound!

The journey's nearly over.  Fez had warned me that they were late risers at the weekend.  How late?  Oh, perhaps 10 in the morning.  Er, well, I'll be leaving early so I'll try not to wake you!  In the end it was 7 o'clock when I crept out, pausing only to fend off the affections of Frankie, a poodle - springer spaniel cross.  He can jump very high indeed. 




Darwin proved itself civilised when I was able to get breakfast at 7:30 on a Sunday morning. Thus fortified I found the airport and the long term car park.



I'll just wait for that Jessica.
At least she'll be nice to me

Huh.  You're off, leaving me behind?


 



















I thought tropical rain storms came in the afternoon?  Well we had one at eight in the morning, and like yesterday's it lasted barely five minutes but was so heavy.  I thought it was going to erupt again as I waited for the shuttle bus but I was spared.

Caught an uneventful flight home, met by Barb, we popped over to Colmslie to pick up Nick and Jan's car (they're off to Tasmania) and drove home separately.

THE END

Details

Jess's car - a diesel Mini, didn't miss a beat.  It has very low profile tires, and on the coarse road surfaces encountered (sealed roads, but with a coarse grit rather than the smooth tarmac of suburbia) they were noisy.  A fun car to drive, very good acceleration and deceptively comfortable - my back often gets very stiff on long journeys, but not in this car.   The engine ran so slowly (a mere 2300 rpm at 130 kph in NT) that it was possible to not realise there were still one or even two gears to go.  Wonderful stuff!

Distance covered - 4047 km.  Would have been about 300 less but for the detour when the road to Cloncurry was closed.  This figure involves driving around the various towns and diversions to see this or that.

Diesel fuel used - 226 litres

Consumption - 5.60 litres per 100km (50 mpg Imperial, 42 mpg US)

Fuel price - varied from around $1.15 per litre in south east Queensland to $1.92 in one or two remote places.  I got away with paying a peak price of $1.86.

Greatest one day distance - 771 km, Duaringa to Winton.  Several other days just short of 700 km.

REALLY THE END