We drove to Stoke’s Wharf in the city to visit the Royal Flying Doctor Service and the Bombing of Darwin exhibitions. Wow! It was great. The RFDS had one of their planes on display for visitors to check out. They also had a couple of holograms of RFDS nurses who talked to us, giving extra information. And, lastly, they had a short film with a hologram of John Flynn, the founder of the RFDS, telling his story of how it all began and expanded through the years. It was very interesting.

The WW2 Bombing of Darwin by the Japanese display took up the the rest of the building and was fantastic! We started with another hologram film narrated by the captain of a ship that was bombed in Darwin Harbour. We learned so much about what happened. In the centre of the exhibition was a platform. Every so often an air raid siren would sound and we were told to hop onto the platform. The lights dimmed and the noise of bombs dropping was all around us. Out the windows we could see Japanese bombers coming towards us and bombs going off in the sea. It really gave us a sense of what it would have been like to be there at the time.

The best was yet to come though. We picked up the goggles for a virtual reality show and that was incredible. Suddenly we were thrust into the middle of the bombing with noise and chaos all around. One minute we were on the ground avoiding being hit by bombs, then we were up in the clouds next to a fighter pilot. It was fantastic!

We would highly recommend anyone visiting Darwin to go along. It is so worthwhile. However, I must say very little kids might find it frightening.

We spent a little while in the gift shop before heading off for coffee. There were quite a few food outlets at the Wharf but, unfortunately no cafe. So we drove five minutes across to the waterfront which was bustling. People were enjoying their Sunday morning swimming at the wave pool or beach, cycling, walking, riding scooters around or, like us, enjoying a relaxing coffee and taking it all in.

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We had a terrific couple of weeks in Darwin. It was lovely to catch up with family and use Summer and Stewart’s place as a base. Although we were looking forward to seeing Kakadu, we also felt sad leaving them.