4 more days...

A Crocodile on our nature cruise up near Darwin -

...until I go to Malaysia and will never have to worry about freezing to death here in Australia! One sleeping bag, two blankets, two hoody's (one on my head), my Nalgene 'hot water bottle' and I'm set for the night. Talk about planning! Have to quickly fill up the water bottle before 930pm when the kitchen closes, then trial it out for leaks, which involves placing the bottle on various places on my bunk and tipping it upside down for unfortunate spillage. I learned the hard way when I was overeager one night and popped it smack-dab in the center of my sleeping bag only to hop in to a wet sleeping bag. I've since further improvised with a sock cover and it is stellar.
Yesterday I gathered all my clothes and headed off to the washroom to change. Note: people in Australia assume I mean 'laundry' when I ask where the washroom is. Perhaps it's just me but I find saying "where is the Toilet?" offensive. So I'm swapping PJs for my daily attire when PLOP, in go my underwear. What to do? The toilet water was 'fresh' so to speak but I really didn't fancy the idea of carrying around the saturated underwear in my pack until my next load of laundry. Doing laundry as a backpacker is a luxury and it doesn't happen often. Me, I'm just wearing my clothes to death and once they have holes in them, I throw them out. But I have a hard time throwing anything away for fear I may 'need them' one day, so my backpack hasn't gotten any lighter!

Anyhow, I'm on my last full day here in Byron Bay and then it's back to Sydney and the company of my good Scottish friend Ruth (and her floor as my bed). Can't wait :)