Kakadu National Park
Trip Start
Sep 02, 2007
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207
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Trip End
May 13, 2009
Kakadu National Park, Northern Territory, Australia
Friday, September 26, 2008
There was no rain and the weather (although SO HOT) was great.
1st up, we happened to drive past a tour company who were offering a tour of jumping crocs - sounds crazy, so we did it. It only cost $30 for a trip down the river and it was nice. Then the tour guides get huge slabs of meat on big fishing rods. Dangle them in the water and the crocks come down the river to sniff out the free meal. Then the meat gets put in the air and the crock jump out of the water and try and grab the meat. It is ian increadible spectical and because we were in the bottom of the boat the crock jump well above our heads - they are all about 3m in length and it was very cool.
After seeing 3 crocs doing their dance for us they then started feeding the eagles with small bits of meat thrown into the air in which the eagles swoop and grab - this, if anything was more amazing to see with 10's of them all swooping around the boat
1-Ubirr Rock Art
. A load of them fighting over the meat and so there is quite a racket going on - a great couple of hours though and set us up for the day ahead nicely.P.S there was also a cool little dog which I played with for an hour while waiting for the tour groups - he was a vicious little thing and almost left more impression on me than the crocks - (physically rather than mentaly)!
We took 2 walks on the way to our sleeping point. The 1st was in a small wooded area in which the sun was beating down so hard. It was only a couple of killometers but seemed like a bit more. There was a load of butterflies and quite a few lizzards scurrying off the path as I walked and it was really pleasent. It became even better when we stumbled accross a massive beautiful billabong with watterlillies on it - it was very special.
Then we clambered back to the van, ate our noodles while trying to avoid the millions of huge green ants on the floor (who are very vicious) and then drove on a bit more to the next walk.
On the 2nd walk there were millions of geese migrating through here, the noise is increadible and we hear them wherever we go, they are in such large quantities it is hard not to be impressed, they just come through in September every year so we, by chance stumbled accross them at the right time - pretty lucky
1-Yellow River
!We then drove passed Jabaru (main town in the area) and on to our 1st campsite in the park. There are 10 free campsites and we chose the best ones located near the best things. The 1st one was in a prime location but to be honest there wasnt too much going on and it was very dull. The flys were absolutly atrochios and it was hard to do anything. It was getting late though and the flys were getting sleepy and then the mosquitos came out - hurrah! This meant I saw the sunset and went straight to sleep in my inner-tent.
Day 2 started as all the days do when we are on the road - very early! Because we go to bed with the sun, we always wake up with it as well - this time helped by 100's of Galars screeming in the treetops. I had difficulty sleeping as I was very weary of the crocs all around but encountered no problems so it really could have been a lot worse :-)
This was our walking and rock art day. The flys have got a lot worse and the weather, unbelieveably has got hotter! I donned my hat and we drove up to Ubirr. This is one of the best rock art sites in the world and our 1st walk was walking around the art, it is very colourful and some of it is very old but the aboriginal people draw over the top of old stories to tell their new ones and so it is almost impossible to date the art
2-Ubirr Rock Art
. We cant help but feel it is Australia trying to give itsself some history an really promoting the rock art but in reality the things we are looking at are generally only 200 years old or so. Still, the detail is amazing and the stories told are very entertaining - usually to teach kids a lesson like not walking in the dark - or not swimming in the billabongs. Generally stuff which any parent would teach their kids. It is pretty cool how this is till practiced in areas and stories are still told on cave walls.The walk was nice but there was a lot of tour groups. This meant we overheared loads of stories and there is a great viewpoint once the climb has been completed over all the savanah land - absolutly stunning and with welcome gusts of air.
On our 2nd walk it was a bit dull, but in between all the burnt up trees (fire is used to re-cultivate the land) we saw a snake on the path, which I antagonised with a bit of rope I was carying to beat away the hordes of flys following us on the walk. This snake didnt do too much but I knew it was a bit dangerous as it was small and dark - this is usually a bad sign. We completed the walk and later on Fabrice found out it was a King Brown - only the deadliest snake in the world!!!!! Probably not the best to antagonise with bits of rope
2-Yellow River
!Then we went on and did our 3rd walk of another 1k - all of them are short but due to the oppressive heat and the rediculous flys a short walk is actually a lot of hard work. The 3rd walk was seeing loads of Geese from a viewing platform - these were amazing and not too many places in the world will you see so many Geese, mixing with Pelicans, gallars, Wallabies, Jabaru's and Igreds - it was loud but very cool. The following 1km walk was dull and pointless once you had seen the viewing platform.
Then we drove on to Jabaru. The town is actually one street, it looks like a selection of wearhouse buildings and is seriusly ugly! So we didnt stop. We got fuel, bread and ice (we get ice all the time now) and drove on to Nouralangie.
Nouralangie is another facinating rock art site in which we walked around all the rock art on a nice multi-level walk. We learned about all the Aboriginal 'Dream-Time' and saw a lot of the gods, deamons etc etched on the walls. The rock art hear was clearly a lot newer then Ubirr but because it was newer the colours were more viberent and the artwork more special in a way.
3-Ubirr Rock Art
Walk 2 was a joke. 250m up to see a viewpoint which was ok but nothing amazing and walk 3 was a 2.5 circuit to see a great canyon of multi layered rocks. The rocks almost loked man mad and the walk here was great. Seing a whole host of birds and I have loved almost every single one of the multitude of walks done over the past 2 days.
I almopst forgot the bats!!!!
One of the walks in Nouralangie meant we encountered 1,000's of bats who went crazy when I started barcking like a dog to scare them. They all flew around and it was increadible!! I also walked into a sludge on the riverbed and got stuck, walking was gard after that with my feet and flipflops caked with something that looked like cement! - I didnt dare wash my feet off in the croc infested water though!
So as the darkness was aproaching we drove to our campsite called jim Jim billabong and slept almost immediatly as the flys were hiddeous and we knew only an hour around the courner the mosquitos were coming. The sunset is the transition from the most annoying insect in the world to the itchiest.
3-Yellow River
Day 3 started rediculously early. We drove to yellow river for the sunrise in which Fabrice went on a cruise down the river to see the area waking up. I walked along the riverside for a couple of hours and saw loads of geese and a lot of mist on the river. The walk was beautiful and nice and cool as the sun hadnt come out yet. I mosquito proofed myself with long layers but there - blistfully was nothing - only a few flys so it was managable.
After a free shower and a coupe of amazing meat pies we drove to Maguk. The waterfalls at Maguk involved a 10km drive down a reduiculously bad road. The bumps were increadible and we drove at a maximum of 10km an hour - it was rough going but we made it to the falls. The falls from the bottom were good and there were a lot of groups so we were not too concerned by the crocs so we spent an hour swimming and jumping aorund here.
Then on our way back a tourguide pesuaded us to walk up to the upper falls. It was only a 15 min walk and once up there it was stunning. Pools and pools of fresh cool water in which you jump from massive heights into them. The water was crystal clear and so nice. We spent another hour here swimming through the gorges in the rock and although a bit weary of crocs as there was no one else here it was fine. I jumped from such a big height once the water gushed up my nose when I landed and came out of my mouth! It felt so weird!
Then we drove back from Maguk. We were going to check outGunlam falls but the road restricted us from going as we didnt have the necessary 4x4. As we couldnt get into the Gunlam falls we had time to burn so we decided to drive out of the National park and camp early.
