Clearing out of Australia: Thursday Island or Darwin?

[PeterBernard]

We are intending to clear out of Aus in early October for Indonesia, with Kupang as our first port of call.

We've been planning to clear out of Thursday Island, and head straight to Kupang, but I'm now wondering if it wouldn't be better to break the journey by stopping in Darwin first, and clearing out there.

We've no particular need for repairs etc (which of course would be one good reason for going via Darwin), so the benefits I can see in going via Darwin would be breaking the journey into 2 x 4/5 day hops (and thus more reliable weather forecasting), plus better victualing at Darwin (if we go straight from TI, we'll do our major provisioning at Cairns or Cooktown, some 10 days prior to leaving TI.

Keen to hear thoughts from anyone who has done either trip (or ideally even both) - what would you do?

[daletournier]

I'd clear out at Thursday island, very easy and you don't add all the extra distance to the trip that you will if you go to Darwin. All so Cape Don isn't always wonderful.
You can break the trip up with several stops, the wessels, port Essendon etc.

[donradcliffe]

I liked Darwin. Worth spending a few days there. Did buy an outboard for the dinghy, tour the town, got my CAIT organized, and went to a Viking funeral at the YC. Went from there to Ashmore Reef, then up to Roti and Flores.