Melburnians staying at the Howard Springs Quarantine Facility have described it as being like a holiday park you can't leave – in a good way. And not all that surprisingly, the weather's nicer too.
Hundreds of Victorians have fled Melbourne's lockdown winter to spend two weeks more than 3700 kilometres away in a tropical quarantine centre about half an hour's drive from Darwin.
Melbourne documentary maker Ben Sale – who arrived in Howard Springs 12 days ago – is quarantining so he can travel to Cairns, where he's due to shoot motorsports event TARGA Great Barrier Reef. Mr Sale is allowed to exercise outside his cabin twice a day for 20 minutes – wearing a mask and at a physical distance from others – and has set himself a goal of running 100 kilometres over the two weeks he spends in quarantine.
Melbourne law graduate Joseph Friedman, who is in his first week at Howard Springs, said the facility was more like a summer camp than a quarantine camp.
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