Kakadu

Kakadu wasn’t at all what I was expecting.  I really had it all wrong.  I imagined all rock outcrops and escarpments and gorges.  Well only a very small part of it was like this. Most of it was quite boring -  low vegetation, small trees and lots of burnt-off . The first sign of the Kakadu I had imagined was the escarpments on the eastern edge of the Kakadu bordering Arnhem Land (the huge area of N E Australia off limits to non aboriginals). It is a special place though, Australia’s largest National Park at 20,000 sq km (a third of the size of Tasmania) It is a window on Aboriginal culture where the oldest rock drawing is dated at 18,000 years.

Visited some interesting rock art site at Ubirr on a forty km detour but it was well worth it. Except that Jill and others watched in awe/dismay as, after a sweaty clamber up a high rocky outcrop, her wide-brimmed hat was swept from her head and sailed like a frisby on drugs out and away over the Savannah.

Rock art at Ubirr, Kakadu NP

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We watched a documented event which is repeated each day at Cahill Crossing on the border to Arnhem Land. The crossing is a ford across the East Alligator River. At the change of tide each day (about 50km from the sea) mullet fish leap over the ford. Large crocodiles know this and lay in wait on the downstream side of the ford, waiting patiently for their lunch/breakfast /dinner.  They actually intercept the fish in their “hands” and sweep the fish towards their mouth.  I kid you not - we were lucky enough to see this.

At Jabiru we visited the Bowali Cultural Centre where we were blown away by the excellent displays and the way knowledge about the indigenous people was provided.  Superb.