Meet Reg Duncan, Darwin to Litchfield

After breakfast, we walk the 3km from the hotel through Darwin’s impressive Botanic Gardens to pick up our car at JJs Car Hire. We had stored it here for the duration of our 4WD hire. It’s a bit dirty but other than that, the kayaks are still on the roof top and the Kluger starts first time.

We head back to the hotel to pick up our luggage stopping off for groceries on the way. After giving the car a car wash, we pick up our campervan form Darwin storage, hook up and set off for the start of another adventure.

This is the final instalment of our Walshies Down Under trip and we are travelling from the top end and down through central Australia visiting amongst other places, Ayres Rock on the way.

DRIVE: Darwin to Litchfield National Park (111km).

Today we drive a short distance to Litchfield National Park.

On the way in we passed through Coomalie Creek & Batchelor where Jenny’s Grandfather, Reg Duncan served in WWII from mid 1943 to October 1945. He was a Leading Airman with the 87 (PR) Squadron (formerly No. 1 PRU) at Coomalie airfield; the photographic unit in the RAAF who went up to do all the aerial reconnaissance photography.

Coomalie airfield was constructed between July & November 1942 and was bombed by the Japanese on three occasions - 27 November 1942 and 13 & 21 August 1943. By June 1945, 87 (PR) Squadron had produced almost 10,500 photographic prints in support of RAAF/USAAF bombing raids to Japanese-held Timor/Indonesia. The last wartime sortie from Coomalie was flown on 15 August 1945 when Mosquito A52-609 set off to photograph targets on Timor. With the Japanese surrender officially announced, the aircraft was recalled to Coomalie where it made a fast low-level pass in celebration of victory. 87 (PR) Squadron remained at Coomalie airfield until 30 October 1945 when it was abandoned.

Pre-WWII, the area known as Rum Jungle was home to one of two demonstration farms established by the Commonwealth in 1912. In 1911, the Commonwealth took over the Territory from South Australia and in a bid to attract people set up farms to model the opportunities available through farming. Didn’t really take off, did it?!

Post-war was when the boom happened. With the US discovery (& use) of atomic weapons, they, and the UK were after uranium “in defence of the free world”. In the early 50s farmers in the area discovered uranium and a new era was born with the establishment of the Rum Jungle Uranium Project in 1954. Batchelor became the third largest town in the NT, after Darwin and Alice Springs. Over 300 men and about 15 single women worked on the project; the women being housed in accommodation known as the Virgins’ Villas and the Nunnery!

CAMP: Litchfield Tourist Park / 2 Nights

It’s so nice to have our campervan set up again and it’s quite luxurious compared to the roof top tent even though we enjoyed that too.

Litchfield Tourist Park is very pleasant as they have real grassy sites and abundant shade trees being constantly watered from a windmill pumping bore water from deep in the ground. In contrast to Broome, the evenings here get much cooler so extra blankets tonight. We are within a few kilometres of Litchfield National Park and look forward to exploring it tomorrow.Read more