Like Arnhem land in the northern part of Australia, Kakadu National Park belongs to traditional Aboriginal owners. It has superb landscapes, wildlife and some of the best Aboriginal Rock Art. It also has a lot of mosquito's. Specially now during the wet season. The temperatures rised to + 35C and the humidity increased.There is less tourists as some of the roads are flooded. Not the ideal time to visit the park, but the good thing about it is that there is an abundance of animal life in these moist conditions. We were lucky to spot some of them and I mean other animals than the mosquito's.
Darwin is a nice city. Rather than being a hard-bitten rough outpost, as we thought, it turned out to be a lively modern place. This town became our base for the tours to the wetlands and rain forest's. We found a nice backpacker place with swimming pool in the center of the town.
Litchfield National Park
A wide sandstone plateau with 4 waterfalls dropping off its edges. Adveturetours took us in a group of 12 to tour the park. Among other natural wonders we discovered huge termite mounds. These little amazing blind fellows are constructing these giant buildings of 5-6 meters in hight. Just incredible.
Hiking and swimming in the pools on the base of the waterfalls was definitely the highlights of this trip. When visiting places like Florence Falls, Wangi Falls and Buley rock holes we admired the beauty of the cascades. But swimming was on our own risk as the area was inhabited by freshwater crocodiles.
Freshwater crocodiles are harmless to people unless provoked, but saltwater crocodiles are definitely dangerous. And these can also be found around here. We heard about several cases where people had been taken. Warning signs were posted alongside many stretches of water. We were to discover more about the "salties" the next day.
One of the guides had been attacked the week before. It was all in the newspapers. He survived. We did too.
Kakadu National Park
This turned out to be a wildlife tour with a difference. More in the style of Crocodile Dundee tour. East of Darwin on Adelaide River we witnessed these giant saltwater crocodiles leaping out of the water using their tail for propulsion. An impressive sight hard to forget. Then we continued to Ubirr and Nourlangie, two spectacular art sites, with magnificent preserved Rock Art, each painting being thousands of years old. The sight of this looming, mysterious, isolated outlier of the Arnhem land escarpment makes it easy to understand why it has been important to Aboriginal people for so long. Aboriginals are the oldest indigenous people on earth and we were curious to learn about their mythology, history and culture. But we discovered that it was difficult for short term visitors like us to make meaningful contact with them as they prefer to be left to themselves. We did some investigation around the area to find out more. Talking to some locals gave as a little insight. We didn't want to leave with only one impression; that of the lost aboriginals on the streets in Darwin, where alcohol abuse and social problems among a small section of the community presented a sad picture.
Our New Years eve was spent in a bush camp in pouring rain but still in good mood with our fellow travelers and the mosquito's. By the morning of the New Years day it had cleared up and breakfast was shared with dingoes and wild horses.
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