Daly Waters

As I mentioned, I've been trying to do a few more trips lately.

One I did on ANZAC Day was down to a little town called Daly Waters, population eight.

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The historic pub was holding a B&S, and being a rural reporter, it was important for me to cover this. Plus, I figure if I have to work on a public holiday I may as well have a bit of fun!

But Daly Waters is also home to one of Australia's biggest World War II airfields, which was also Australia's first international airport! There are heaps and heaps of WWII airfields around Katherine, I think the strategy was that if one was bombed or taken, there were others to fill the gaps. But Daly Waters was a big one.

I did a story on a whole heaps of old beer bottles that are near the base. Our old diggers didn't mind a drink, as it turns out.

The runway is a bit run down now, as you can see. I'm sure you can imagine that I drove responsibly and hesitantly drove the car down there.

Amazingly the runway is still in use with light aircraft, but I suppose you could land a Cessna is a lot of interesting places.

Daly Waters became the first international airport in Australia because Qantas used it as a refuelling stop on its route to Singapore, and it was also used in a big air race from London to Sydney in 1926. This is the original Qantas hangar, it now has a bit of a museum inside which is pretty interesting, if a little information dense.

Apparently the wife of the publican would come down with tea for the passengers, as they had to stop for about half an hour. The creek is between the pub and the airport though, so she used to have to take a high rope kind of thing to get across!